


Heaven's Got a Plan for You

by tobytrash



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Anxiety Attacks, Arguments, Blue Paladin Allura, Canon verse, Dealing With Loss, Drama, Fluff, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, Langst, Lots of Crying, M/M, Mild Language, Mutual Pining, Mystery, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, PINING KEITH, Shenanigans, Slow Burn, Stress, Team Bonding, allura is still struggling with trusting the galra, black paladin lance, but i promise there's plenty of, character death but not really, emotional rollercosters, eventual physical injury, everyone is upset lmao, it's kinda canon divergent though, keith is highkey pining, klance, klangst, lance insecurities, lance is also highkey pining he's just trying to keep it lowkey, magical lion bullshit, nobody knows what happened to shiro, ok i know this looks angsty af, pining lance, right after shiro disappears, she/her pronouns for pidge, so like, some hunk/shay on the side, this is post season 2
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-26
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-09-27 00:29:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 39,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9941132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tobytrash/pseuds/tobytrash
Summary: The Galra Empire and Team Voltron have never been as vulnerable as they are now. With Shiro missing and no leads on his mysterious departure, a reassignment of lions are in order as our heroes struggle to get back up on their feet and learn how to form Voltron once more.Unfortunately for Lance, he isn't so ready to accept these new assignments.And neither is the Black Lion.(takes place right after season 2, has several canon divergences)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> OH BOY HERE WE GO  
> i'm super excited to start this fic, i hope you like it!! 
> 
> cover art was done by me, you guys can talk to me about the fic and/or black paladin lance on my blog, Sniperlance.tumblr.com !
> 
> also very special thanks to my betas for going over this chapter, you guys rock <3

 

* * *

 

 

It’s been three days since the battle against Zarkon.

 

Three days since the paladins of Voltron, the Universe’s last hope for freedom and prosperity, split the Galra empire open like a beehive and sent them reeling into the deep reaches of space with wounds that would take many, many quintants to recover from, and many many decafeebs to forget.

 

Three days since the disappearance of their leader, Takashi Shirogane.

 

Once they discovered he was nowhere on the ship, and had no leads as to where he could’ve possibly gone, the team had to face the sickening possibility that he did not survive the fight. Everyone had been affected by Shiro’s absence, one way or the other.

 

Allura reacted with quiet anger, her hatred for Zarkon burning brighter than ever before now that she had lost another fellow comrade to the fight against the Galra. It fueled her actions as a leader, made her sharper and more calculating.

  
Coran seemed duller, his chippy personality flickering like a slowly burning candle. He tried to keep a positive outlook, willing the team to look on the bright side of things, but even Lance could tell that he as upset as the rest of them.

 

Hunk had been shocked into disbelief, reaching for every possibility that Shiro was still alive. Every direction was a dead end, and the reality of the situation had quickly sunk in. In order to cope with this, Hunk busied himself with helping Coran make repairs to the ship.

 

Pidge was very shaken up, crying out of frustration that another one of the few individuals she considered family had been taken away by the hands of the Galra. Lance found himself sitting with her and holding her in his arms while she cried, trying his best to offer reassuring words despite his own condition.

 

Lance was a robot. Or at least, that’s what he felt like. His emotions seemed to disconnect from the rest of the world as he attempted to process things. This whole situation was so surreal to him,  he often wondered if it was all just a dream.

 

Shiro? Gone?

 

It didn’t feel like something that was possible to Lance. Shiro had always stood with his head held high, invincible to everything, unwavering to anything. He was a shining beacon of strength and wisdom that lead the team through the darkness that was this war. Lance could never imagine Shiro falling.

 

And yet…

 

Lance’s attention drifted back into the present. He felt himself squeezing the ends of his sleeves, trying to ground himself as the voices of his teammates floated around him. He only caught the tail end of something Hunk was saying.

 

“-ion, then who’s gonna pilot Red?”

 

Oh, right.

 

Apparently Shiro had left Keith in charge, if anything were to happen to him. Which means that he’d be piloting the black lion from now on, and also telling everyone what to do.

 

Lance’s eyes fell upon the soon-to-be black paladin, who stood a little bit away from the rest of the group. His arms were crossed as always, that same ‘ol frown he wore on his face present on his features. Though, Lance could tell by the way his jaw was set that he was wound up by stress.

 

Lance knew that Keith was likely the most shaken up by Shiro’s disappearance than all of them. Keith and Shiro were close.

 

After it was concluded that Shiro was gone, as Lance held Pidge’s shaking form, he remembers seeing the red paladin quietly excuse himself from the room. The look of pain on his face was one of the rawest emotions Lance has seen Keith show since he’s known him.

 

Later that night, while Lance was helping Coran and Hunk clean up some shattered lights that had been scattered across the floor of one of the castle hallways, he spotted Keith on his way back to the Bridge. The red paladin’s eyes looked tired and sick.

 

Everyone was called up to the bridge not long after that. Keith made the announcement, that Shiro wanted him to lead. Lance didn’t think he’d ever seen Keith look that small and afraid before.

 

Lance didn’t like it one bit, but he couldn’t seem to find it in himself to complain right now. Not when he felt waves of apathy rolling over his mind like the grey ocean on a day with overcast weather, muting his emotions with the sounds of the sea crashing on the shore. Lance could detect a buzz in the air, as if there was a storm approaching on the far horizon. It made his stomach curl in on itself.

 

“We’re still down a paladin” Pidge said, slumped in her chair. Despite her lifeless body language, she seemed to be doing a little better than the night before when Allura told them that they’d have to discuss the issue at hand.

 

Coran stroked his mustache, a thoughtful look on his tired features. “We’ll have to recruit a new paladin as soon as possible! I could try looking into possible candidates from the planets that are already in the Voltron alliance. If we’re lucky, the red lion will find a new match that suits her well. What say you, Princess?”

 

All eyes turned to Allura, who watched the stars drifting by outside the windows of the Bridge. She had a look of resolve on her face, as if she just made one of the most important decisions in her life.

 

“That won’t be necessary, Coran” Allura replied, turning to face the rest of the group. Her stance was tense, but her eyes were certain. “I will take responsibility for the loss of Shiro by piloting a lion myself.”

 

There were surprised gasps all around the room. Lance felt his eyebrows raise in question.

 

“We do not have the time to look for a replacement, we need to make sure that Voltron can be formed as soon as possible. So, I will become a paladin.” she elaborated, adjusting the crown on her forehead.

 

“But who’s going to pilot the ship? Who’s going to make wormholes?” Pidge asked quizzically, her arms crossing over her chest.

 

“Coran can pilot the castle, and the lions are capable of creating wormholes” Allura simply replied, as if it should be common sense to know such things about the inner workings of the castle and the lions.

 

“Princess, I know you’re upset by...what happened, but maybe it would be safer for you to keep piloting the castle…?” Hunk mumbled, his hands fidgeting with the hem of his shirt anxiously.

 

Coran came up to rest a hand on Allura’s shoulder, his worry giving out. The princess looked up at the older Altean, exchanging unspoken words.

 

The princess nodded, determination lighting up her soft features. She then looked around at the rest of the group, Lance felt his stomach jerk with anxiety.

 

“I am part of this fight too. I cannot stand by any longer while the rest of you put your lives on the line every day in this war. I will become a paladin, and fight alongside you from now on. Does anyone have any objections?”

 

For the first time since Lance regained focus on the conversation, Keith spoke up.

 

“It’s going to be dangerous, but if you’re sure about this…”

 

Allura glanced at Keith, acknowledging his concern, before looking back to the rest of the group. Her mouth twisted in a tight line of determination as she scanned the faces of everyone.

 

“Guess we have that figured out,” Lance muttered, stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets. “Allura will pilot Red, and Keith’ll get the black lion. Cool beans”. His words didn’t mask the faint trace of sarcasm in his voice.

 

Allura then turned to Lance, her expression softening. Lance wasn’t sure if he liked the expression she had.

 

“I’m afraid it won’t be that simple, Lance”.

 

Lance raised a questioning eyebrow at the princess, frowning a bit. “Whatt’ya mean?”

 

“In order to assure that we will be able to form Voltron as soon as possible, I will need to be assigned to the blue lion. She is the most accepting of new pilots, which will make it easier for me to join the rest of you. This means you will need to be re-assigned to the red lion. I am terribly sorry, Lance”.

 

Lance felt his stomach fall to his feet. The first echoes of thunder rapped on the insides of his skull. Something wasn’t right in his mind and Lance could feel it.

 

“Uh, no? I’m not leaving the blue lion.”

 

Was she kidding? There was no _way_ Lance was going to split up with Blue! Especially just to, to take Keith’s lion. _No way. That’s not happening. Not in a million years. Absolutely not._

 

Lance couldn’t even imagine him piloting Red at all. He just couldn’t. The very thought made ice prick at his neck and his throat tighten.

 

Allura blinked in surprise, not expecting Lance to reject the idea. “Why not?”

 

Pidge raised her head from where she sat, and Hunk inched a bit closer to Lance, looking at him with a questioning expression. Lance’s eyes hardened, solidifying his choice.

 

“Blue’s with me guys, I’m not changing lions. Besides, what about all that junk about lion’s choosing their pilots? I thought it wasn’t a bond that can be forced?”

 

“I’m sure the red and blue lions will understand, Lance. They won’t like it anymore than you do, but it must be done,” Allura replied sympathetically.

 

“Yeah well, too bad. Sorry, Allura, but me and the blue lion are like this-” Lance crossed his fingers and held them up to put emphasis on his words. He didn’t want anyone coming between him and his lion. Not Allura, not Keith, not even another lion.

 

Keith stepped forward, arms falling to his sides and his frown deepening. Lance immediately felt his defenses go up, ready to take on whatever bullshit Keith was about to say.

 

“You don’t have a choice, Lance. We have to be able to form Voltron,” the dark haired paladin growled, pinning Lance down with his sharp stare. Lance met his eyes with a glare of his own, and suddenly the room felt crowded and stuffy.

 

In that moment, Lance felt something inside him change. Among the droning waves of apathy numbing his senses, a single emotion shot up his spine with breathtaking force, making his heart rate spike and stomach twist. _Anger_.

 

Lance reveled in it, accepted it, and possibly even welcomed it. Because for the first time in three days, at least he could feel _something_.

 

The words fell out of his mouth before he could stop himself, like a crack splitting down the side of a dam. “Funny you say that, _Keith_ , because it sure as hell seems like _Shiro_ had a _choice_.”

 

“Guys, can we not do this please?” Pidge sighed as she sat up, re-adjusting her glasses.

 

Keith ignored the warning, instead he took another step forward, eyes narrowing to a fine point. “What is that supposed to mean?”

 

“Shiro seemed to really favor you, didn’t he? It’s no wonder he picked you to be leader. He didn’t even bother asking the person who’s actually qualified to lead the team,” Lance paused, gesturing to Allura. “That’s not very fair, if you ask me.”

 

“Shiro wanted me to lead because he knew what I was capable of!” Keith defended with a raised voice, his hands balling into fists at his side. The crack in his voice betrayed his uncertainty.

 

Lance rolled his eyes, sneering. “Yeah, capable of charging off into battle without thinking things through.”

 

Keith looked like he was about to respond, but Allura cut him off. “Enough! Both of you! We will not make any progress with the two of you bickering like this!” she snapped. Lance glared at his feet.

 

Allura seemed to hesitate for a moment before continuing, looking at Keith with an unreadable expression. “Shiro knew what he was doing when… he asked Keith to lead. I suggest that you have more faith in his decisions, Lance.” she turned her head, looking at the blue paladin. When he didn’t respond, Hunk interjected.

 

“Okay, but can we please get back on topic? All this arguing is stressing me out, and I’m already pretty stressed out.”

 

The rest of the group besides Lance and Keith nodded in agreement.

 

“Yes, of course, Hunk,” Allura nodded, rubbing her arms as if she were brushing off the tension. While the group quietly relaxed, Keith continued to glare at Lance, and Lance could practically feel it burning into the side of his skull.

 

It spurred his defenses to react again.

 

“I’m still not changing lions. Not happening,” he muttered.

 

Despite Keith’s growl of frustration, Lance heard Hunk sigh beside him.

 

“What’s your problem, _Lance_?! This is important!” Keith snapped, approaching Lance like a threatening panther closing in on it’s prey. Lance gritted his teeth, refusing to back up from Keith.

 

“The universe depends on us, and you’re choosing to be _selfish_! That isn’t what Voltron stands for!” his voice was raising again, as was Lance’s heart rate. Ice shot through Lance’s veins and crawled up his spine, causing his stomach to jerk. The dam couldn’t hold any longer.

 

With a startling explosion of anger, Lance screeched.

 

“Well maybe! I’m sick! Of acting! Like _YOUR_ REPLACEMENT ALL THE TIME!”

 

Keith stumbled back, caught off guard by the sudden outburst. Everyone went silent, an ugly tension filling the air like crackling lightning. Yeah, that storm was definitely here now.

 

And Lance knew it.

 

His heartbeat raged alongside the twisting and churning ocean waves slapping the shore with a violent force in his mind. Rain threatened to break overhead in the form of tears welling in Lance’s eyes. The wind howled with thoughts rushing through his head, going a million miles a second, and shook Lance’s body with visible tremors.

 

He held eye contact with Keith for a solid thirty ticks before the realization struck him. Everyone was staring now. Lance looked around at the group. Everyone had shock and...worry painted on their features. It made Lance sick.

 

_No, no, no, no, don’t you guys get all suddenly worried about me now. I’m not having this, not now._

 

As that dam broke open, Lance could feel all his pent up emotions that he’s been avoiding come rushing out, swirling and choking him, threatening to drown him. It made his lip quiver as he tried to hold his steely frown.

 

“Uh… Lance?” Hunk hesitantly reached a hand out to his friend, who sucked in a sharp breath to force back the sob that threatened to rip through him. Before Hunk could place his hand on his shoulder, Lance spun around and fled, rushing to the doors.

 

He needed to get out of there. He couldn’t let his team see him break like this. He couldn’t.

 

“Lance!” Pidge called out, scrambling out of her seat. Coran took a few quick steps after the blue paladin, but faltered with hesitation. Lance disappeared behind the closing doors to the Bridge, and the rest of the team was left staring at where they last saw him.

 

“Oh man…” Hunk whined sadly, lowering his hand.

  
Keith continued to watch the door with wide eyes, remaining silent.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sorry in advance lmao this chapter is really heavy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY HECK  
> okay, first off i want to say THANK YOU SO MUCH for all the wonderful comments and support for this fic!!! i got such a positive response from the last chapter and i'm just, so thankful for all your guys' kind words!!! i honestly didn't expect there to such a big response lmao. thank you guys, i hope you continue to enjoy this fic. i certainly am enjoying writing it!!!
> 
> second of all, i updated the tags because i've fleshed out some things in the story! by the looks of things, this fic is gonna be kinda like a slow burn? so yeah. make sure to pay attention to the tags because i'll be updating them as the story progresses.
> 
> thanks again for reading! you can scream at me on my blog over at http://sniperlance.tumblr.com/ ~!  
> and as always, thank you my wonderful betas for helping me out on this!  
> enjoy the chapter <3<3<3

“Laaaance, come on! We still have plans we gotta make!”

 

“They can figure it out without me, s’not like I was contributing much anyways”.

 

“Aw, buddy, that’s not true. You were totally contributing!”

 

“...”

 

“If you come down, I promise I’ll make you some of that special food goo soup that I know you like! You know, the kind with the candy flavored spice we picked up from that one planet with the...uh... Bluxarian people? I think that’s what they were called? Yeah! You know those guys! They lived in those giant huts that were made entirely out of sugar and always made their food taste really sweet? C’mon, you loved that stuff!”

 

“...”

 

“Sorry Hunk”.

  


The yellow paladin’s shoulders slumped and he looked down from the blue lion. They were in the main lion chamber, where all the lions had mysteriously gathered around the black lion, who still remained laying on it’s side. The lion hadn’t moved since being towed back onto the ship after the fight against Zarkon. It was a haunting sight, to see the lion appear so lifeless. Allura had assured the team that the lion was alive, “it was just resting”, as she is connected to all the lions’ lifeforces and can feel their energies resonating from each other.

 

But Hunk still had an unshakeable feeling that something was wrong. Why were all the lions gathered around Black like this? It didn’t feel right, something about this situation just felt off to Hunk. It made his stomach churn with uneasiness.

 

All of the lions had been pretty banged up from their fight, and Hunk knew he would be spending a lot of time helping Coran fix them up.

 

Looking back up at the blue lion as he recollected his thoughts, Hunk sighed. He wished there was something he could do to help Lance.

 

Switching lions wasn’t a fun thing to think about, especially considering the bond all the paladins share with their lions. Hunk felt sympathetic for his friend, knowing that this wasn’t an easy task for him to do.

 

Though, he knew that there was more to the having to switch lions thing. Something was obviously wrong, actually, he’s known there was something wrong for a while now. He’s known Lance long enough to be able to tell when he wasn’t doing as okay as he usually is.

 

It was the little things that gave him away, the way his smile would fall and he’d stare off into empty space, the tone of his voice not having that excited lift it usually does. When he’d make up an excuse to leave the room and find a place to be by himself.

 

Hunk noticed that Lance has been doing this a lot more than usual, lately.

 

He knew that Lance didn’t like talking about what was bothering him, but Hunk felt like that was the problem. It was the _lack_ of talking about it and letting himself feel bad for a while that put pressure on Lance’s emotions and caused him to have these outbursts at the worst times. It was unhealthy, and made Hunk feel worried for his friend.

 

The yellow paladin thought about what Lance said before he left the Bridge about an hour ago. The tone in his friend’s voice as he shouted at Keith made Hunk’s stomach twist with anxiety.

 

He knew what needed to be done, but Hunk felt like maybe he could at least help Lance calm down a bit before he talked to Keith. The silence that filled the air with the lack of a response from Lance made Hunk wonder if his friend was in a stable enough condition to try and face this again. He couldn’t tell, what with the way the blue paladin practically locked himself in the blue lion’s cockpit.

 

Sighing again, Hunk made his decision. One way or the other, Lance and Keith were going to have to make up. With Shiro gone, the team just couldn’t afford rifts like this to be allowed to grow between them. They have to become stronger and heal together. They have to be a team.

  


“Alright, uh… I guess I’ll just, let you have some “me-time” for a while. If you think you might be interested that soup though, you know I’m your guy” Hunk grinned nervously as he pointed at himself with a thumb. There was a long pause before Lance spoke.

 

“Okay”.

 

Shoulders slumping again, Hunk turned and made his way out of the chamber. Hunk could feel the yellow lion sending him encouraging vibes as he approached the door. He appreciated his lion’s thoughtfulness.

 

Though, he knew that this was going to be difficult. But they didn’t have a choice.

 

 

* * *

  


Keith stood with the rest of the team on the Bridge, gathered around Slav. The multi-limbed quantum mechanic was laying on his side, one arm propping up his head, half of the rest hanging off the dashboard, while the rest tapped away at the screen.

 

“Seriously, I still do not see the point of those ziplines! They are so inefficient for getting to your lions! Those must be the first things to go when you repair this ship, it will increase our chances of survival in this reality by 23 percent!” Slav chattered, lifting up one of his arms to scratch his side.

 

Keith could almost feel a vain starting to pop out of his forehead now. He was _so done_ with this eight-armed alien. It had been nearly forty five dobashes since Slav was called up to the Bridge -to help make plans for ship upgrades, and Keith already felt like he’s had enough to do with Slav for the rest of his life. He wasn’t sure how Shiro managed to to bring the quantum mechanic all the way here without popping him in the face with a fist.

 

“For the last time! Ziplines were fashionable ten thousand years ago. My castle isn’t exactly hip with the latest technologies, so if you would be so kind as to stop bringing the subject up, Slav” Allura ground out, clearly having been fed up as Keith. Everyone who was gathered looked visibly annoyed too. It made Keith feel a little better that he wasn’t the only one.

 

Though, there was one person who seemed to keep a level headed posture.

  


Keith glanced out of the corner of his eye, over at Kolivan. The Blade of Marmora soldier looked as stoic as ever, watching the screen with his arms crossed over his chest. He was here to offer ideas on what kinds of upgrades the ship could use.

 

During the fight against Zarkon, there had originally been another soldier who accompanied Kolivan. His name was Antok. The two of them fought alongside Princess Allura against the witch Haggar, and her druid followers. Unfortunately, Antok hadn’t survived the fight, and Kolivan had to leave his brother in arms behind.

 

Keith shuddered a little.

  


The sound of the Bridge doors opening caught his attention, and Keith looked over his shoulder to see Hunk emerging into the room, a tired and defeated look on his face. It wasn’t a good sign.

 

“Okay, Keith, you seriously need to go talk to Lance already” Hunk went straight to the point as he approached the group. Keith felt his heart rate spike anxiously.

 

“Why do I gotta do it?” he groaned. The last thing Keith wanted to do was confront Lance...not after that outburst he had earlier.

 

After Lance left, Keith felt his stomach roil with anxiety and stress. This argument had been different than the petty banter they usually got themselves into. Something about the aura that had pulsed off of Lance and filled the room when he screeched was foreboding to Keith, and set off his anxiety like a pack of thermals.

 

Not that Keith wasn’t anxious already...everyone was. But that was besides the point.

Keith tried to ignore it, force down the anxiety attack so he could deal with the rest of the team and make plans with Allura. Be a leader, like he was supposed to be.

 

But... no matter how hard he tried to focus… he couldn’t stop feeling like his skin was too tight, like his chest wasn’t big enough for his lungs. He knew he needed to be alone, find a place where he can take his emotions out on something. Keith longed for the training deck. He always used it when he felt like this, it helped him clear his mind and gave him something specific to focus on.

 

Keith wanted to hope that Lance would just come back when he was done pouting and the team could finish their next plan of action, but that had been an hour ago. Hunk left the group to go track down Lance and try to console him not too long after he stormed out the door, but it seems like he wasn’t successful in his attempt.

 

“Uh, because you’re our leader now? You kinda have to deal with these kinds of things?” Hunk placed his hands on his hips, pinning Keith underneath his “no nonsense” look.

 

“Yeah, but-” Keith tried to protest but Hunk cut him off.

  


“Okay, look, I get that you don’t wanna deal with the situation but you kinda have to anyways because it’s your’s and Lance’s quarrel. Go talk to him and solve the problem. It’s what Shiro would do”.

 

Keith stared at Hunk for a moment before sighing and looking down. He knew that Hunk was right. He just… had a lot on his plate already.

 

“Okay” Keith mumbled, almost pouting a bit. He felt the warm weight of Hunk’s hand on his shoulder, an encouraging gesture.  Keith looked up at his friend, who smiled at him a bit.

 

“You can do it Keith. Lance is in his lion. Shouldn’t be that hard to find”.

  
  


* * *

 

 

Making his way to the lion chamber through the halls of the castle, Keith thought about what he was going to say.

 

He was still frustrated with Lance refusing to let Allura pilot his lion. It was selfish and stupid. Didn’t he realize how important it was that they were able to form Voltron at any given moment?

 

Did Lance think that this wasn’t hard for Keith? It wasn’t like Keith wanted to leave his lion either, but he didn’t have any choice. Shiro was missing, which meant that they needed someone to take his place for now. And… Shiro asked him to do it if something happened...so now he really didn’t have a choice at all. It wasn’t like Keith wanted to do this…

 

And it’s not even going to be a permanent change. It will only be temporary, just until they find Shiro. Once they got him back, he will be back in the black lion and everything could go back to normal.

 

Keith refused to acknowledge the possibility that Shiro was dead. They had no way of knowing if that was true, so that meant that he could still be alive somewhere. They just needed to search more. Coran and Allura said that they hadn’t found any trace of the black paladin on the ship, and had no means of finding out what happened to him, but Keith didn’t believe that was true.

 

There had to be a way. There _had_ to be something.

 

Maybe… maybe the black lion knew something that the team didn’t. Maybe once Keith sat down in that cockpit, the black lion would reveal to him where Shiro was.

 

Maybe Shiro had been teleported to some random planet, like what happened when the wormhole collapsed. He could be sitting there, waiting for the team to come get him right now.

 

Either way, Keith had already convinced himself that Shiro was still alive out there somewhere.

 

He had to be.

 

 

Keith didn’t realize that he had made it to the main lion chamber until he almost ran into one of the lions.

 

Suddenly, he was having second thoughts about this.

 

What was he supposed to say? He wasn’t an expert on other people’s feelings. He picked fights, not fixed them. And there was no guarantee that Lance would even bother listening to him. Keith had a feeling that this wasn’t going to go well.

 

Still though, he knew he had to try. Hunk was right, it’s what Shiro would do…

  


Stepping up to the blue lion, Keith hesitated for a moment before calling out to Lance.

 

“Uh, hey Lance! Are you up there?”

 

There was a beat of silence before Keith heard a loud groan come on over the Blue lion’s speaker. “Seriously? First Hunk, now Keith?? What happened to “me time”?!”

Keith blinked at the blue lion. “Uh...Lance?”

 

“Wait- crap. Is this thing still on?” came Lance’s voice again, followed by the sound of fumbling and tapping. Then, a click, the sound of the mic being switched off.

 

Keith rubbed the palms of his hands with his fingers. “Lance, I need to talk to you”.

 

There was another beat of silence before a reply came. “Uhhhh, this is the blue lion. Lance isn’t here right now. please leave a message after the beep and then take a hike. _Beeeeep!_ ”.

 

Keith grit his teeth in impatience. Why did this boy have to be so difficult all the time?

 

“Lance, I know you are up there. Hunk told me. Would you come down here so we can talk?”

 

A sigh came through the speaker and a tone that sounded frustrated. “‘What? It was worth a shot, Blue,” Lance paused, and Keith could picture him leaning closer to the mic with a scoff on his face. “And noooope, I’m not coming down. Go away”.

 

“Lance, come on! I know you’re upset! We need to talk this out!” Keith huffed impatiently as he tried to convince the blue paladin to come down, hands balling into fists.

 

“Nah, no thanks. I’m perfectly fine up here. I’m not going anywhere” Lance replied through the mic nonchalantly. Keith wanted to scream. It was bad enough he was already stressed out over this whole moving lions thing, but Lance choosing to be difficult certainly wasn’t helping at all. Keith felt his gut clenching with anxiety and frustration, and for a moment his vision began to swim and he felt light headed. Keith squeezed his eyes shut, wincing.

 

_Patience. Yields. Focus._

  


The red paladin forced himself to take several deep breaths, trying to regulate his heartbeat and calm down. He knew he was on the verge of an anxiety attack, but he couldn’t let it happen here. He had to deal with Lance first.

 

Opening his eyes again, Keith looked up at the blue lion, studying it. If Lance wouldn’t listen to Keith....maybe he would listen to Blue?

 

Keith reached out a hand and rested it on the side of the mighty robot’s paw.

 

“I know he’s upset but… we have to talk this out. Please, I need your help…”

 

There were several beats of silence, and for a moment Keith was almost convinced that even the lion wouldn’t listen to him either. He could feel the paranoid thoughts beginning to poke and prod at his mind when the lion suddenly shifted.

 

Keith backed up in slight awe as the blue lion crouched down, tilted her head forward, and promptly opened her mouth. A startled yelp came from the speakers, and suddenly Lance was being ejected out the blue lion’s jaws, rolling down her tongue and landing on the cold surface of the lion chamber floor.

 

“Ow! What the quiznack’s your deal, Blue?!” Lance snapped as he quickly sat up, glaring up at the robotic lion. Blue straightened up and stared down at her paladin. Keith could almost feel the amusement radiating off her.

 

“Betrayal! I can’t believe you, my lion, would do this to me! How could you, Blue?” Lance whined, arms flailing about. Keith couldn’t suppress the fond smirk that found it’s way onto his lips. Lance was cute when he was annoyed.

 

Er, cute in an endearing kind of way. Like how a puppy is cute. Totally not cute-cute, like, so cute you’d have a crush on the person. Absolutely not that. Nope.

  
  


… Ah, who was Keith kidding? It wasn’t a secret that he had caught feelings for the blue paladin. At least, not to himself. He was _pretty sure_ nobody else knew about it. Keith prefered to keep it that way anyways. It wasn’t like he had the time to dwell on such feelings, not when he was in the middle of an intergalactic war. And so, Keith shooed away the warm bubbling feelings of fondness rising in his chest so he could focus on the task at hand.

 

And as he remembered the task at hand, he remembered that he was supposed to somehow make up with Lance. Somehow, he was supposed to find out what was causing the problem. His anxious thoughts crackled in the back of his head, like a flame licking at a burning tree.

  


“I trusted you, Blue. I. Trusted. You.” Lance pouted, pushing himself to his feet and dusting himself off. Keith rubbed his arm awkwardly, not really sure how to start this now that Lance was right in front of him. The blue paladin patted off his shoulder and caught Keith’s eye, expression shifting from a pout to an annoyed scowl.

 

Now that Keith could see him, he noticed that Lance’s eyes were red and puffy, with bags hanging underneath.

 

The red paladin felt his heart clench at the thought of what Lance must have been doing up in that lion for the past varga and a half.

  


Keith opens his mouth to say something, taking a step forward, but Lance immediately cuts him off with a raised hand.

 

“Ah- ah- ah! I don’t wanna hear it! Leave me alone, Keith. I don’t wanna talk”.

 

Keith’s open mouth twists into a scowl and he furrows his brows in irritation. Holy Crow Lance really grated his nerves.

 

“I’m not going anywhere. There is obviously a problem here and we gotta fix it. So we can be a team again” he huffed. Lance crossed his arms, a sign of defensiveness.

 

“There isn’t a problem” Lance said a-matter-o-factly.

 

“I- wh- Yes there is! You’re upset! You’ve been crying!” Keith gaped, flabbergasted. His arms shot out to his sides, emphasising his exasperation. Lance squinted, looking off to the side.

 

“Nothing is wrong. I think you just need to mind your own business” the blue paladin muttered in warning.

 

Keith ignored the warning. Instead he pressed on, determined to get past Lance’s fire wall and figure out what was bothering him.

 

“It _is_ my business now because Shiro left me in charge!” snapped the red paladin as Lance glared in the direction of the black lion. That got his attention, and Lance turned his head back to Keith, a guarded look on his face.

 

“Yeah? Well I don’t care. Just go away already” he growled lowly. He turned away, marching towards the blue lion’s paw. Keith followed him stubbornly.

 

“Lance, if we’re going to work as a team, you can’t be closing yourself off like this” Keith tried to reason, though it came out more like a command than a suggestion.

 

Lance halted and squared his shoulders. He turned his head back to the red paladin with a glare. “I’m not closing off anything! I just want some alone time, _if that’s too much to ask!_ ”

  


Keith could feel his impatience rising dangerously. It was taking a lot of effort to not suddenly start shouting. “Yes you are! I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what your problem is!”

 

Lance spun around, clearly just as aggravated as Keith was. “My “problem” is that you won’t go away!”

 

Keith felt his hopelessness and frustration crack open and spill out across his mind, his anxiety spiking like gasoline catching fire.

 

“God, what did I do to make you hate me so much!? Whatever it is, I’m sorry! _Okay?_ I didn’t ask Shiro to put me in charge!” he cried.

 

Lance eyebrows shot up and his arms fell to his sides. “I don’t hate you!” he insisted.

 

“Then why are you acting like this?!” Keith shouted, voice cracking a bit. He took another step forward, just wishing Lance would stop being so damn _difficult._

  


“ _Because_ _I hate myself!_ ”

  


Keith blinked, falling silent.

  
  


...What?

  
  


Lance….hated himself?

  
  


_How?_

 

Keith was at a loss for words, trying to contemplate this. Lance was standing there, hands balled into fists, shoulders trembling, eyes pinned to his feet.

 

It didn’t make sense. Lance boasted about himself all the time. He radiated self confidence all the time. How....could he possibly hate _himself_?

 

Keith watched the blue paladin with huge eyes, blanking on what he should say.

 

He couldn’t think of anything, anything to say except…

  


“How?”

 

Lance sighed, shutting his eyes and letting his shoulders go slack. Turning away a bit, he lifted a hand and wiped at the tears that were beginning to well in his eyes. He cursed, hand moving to cover his eyes. His mouth was pulled down in a tight wince, and he sniffled quietly.

 

“Lance…?” Keith’s voice was a quiet plea, giving way to his desperation.

 

When the other boy didn’t reply, Keith tried again.

 

“I don’t understand....you always talk about how great you are…” he trailed off, still not knowing what he should say.

 

Lance turned back to Keith, pulling his hand away from his face suddenly so he could look at the red paladin. “I know! It’s how I cope!” he snapped. Keith flinched a bit and Lance sighed, hand falling to his side.

 

“Do you honestly think I’m not aware of how pathetic I am? I’m not that stupid, Keith”.

 

Keith was silent. Lance continued.

  


“I’m not smart like Pidge, or- or strong like Hunk, or...fucking _perfect_ at everything like you are. I’m just a joke, okay?”

 

Keith wanted to say something. Anything. But he couldn’t seem to form the words that would convey how he felt at that moment. He didn’t agree with what Lance was saying, but...for some reason he felt like now wasn’t the time to try and argue. Maybe it was the way Lance looked so small and vulnerable at this moment, like one false step would cause Lance to flee again like a frightened animal.

 

It occurred to Keith that he’s never seen Lance look so wounded before. It made his heart tighten with a foreign emotion unknown to Keith.

 

Lance seemed to be waiting for Keith to respond, but, since he wasn’t saying anything…

  


The blue paladin changed the subject then, hugging his arms and looking away. The expression on his face looked distant and far away, as if he was looking back on a memory.

 

“Back at the Garrison, you were the most talented pilot of our generation. You were a fighter pilot and I was just a cargo pilot. But once you left, I was able to move up and take your place” Lance started. His voice was soft despite sounding still oh so guarded. Keith listened intently, recalling the time he was kicked out of the academy.

 

Lance continued.

  


“And I was _happy_. I was so proud of myself. I actually got into the class I wanted to be in for so long! I even went home to my family for a few days to celebrate my new achievement and they all were so excited for me…” Lance smiled faintly, thinking back on the memory with fondness.

 

“But...then I realized something,” his smile fell, the life in his eyes draining again. His face screwed up in faint wince, as if he was tasting something bitter on his tongue.

 

“The reason- the _only reason_ I was even _in_ that class was because _you_ left” Lance gestured to Keith with a hand as he continued.

 

“I didn’t actually _achieve_ anything. I was just... there to fill the space you left behind…” Lance looked to Keith finally, and the red paladin swore he had never seen Lance look so broken before.

 

Lance took in a deep breath, lowering his gaze and stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets.

 

“So...this whole “lion re-assignment” thing just...it just feels like… like I’m back in the Garrison and-” he paused, swallowing. Lance’s voice was raw with emotion. He sounded like he was going to start crying again. Keith’s heart ached for the blue paladin, but still he remained silent.

 

Lance sighed, hands going to his face again to cover his eyes with the palms of his hands, fingers combing through his brown hair. Turning around, Lance went and sat down against the blue lion’s giant metal paw, pulling his knees up to his chest. It was...a pitiful sight to see.

 

Keith stood there, still contemplating all that Lance had just told him. He honestly had no idea that Lance felt this way.

  


It was so... unexpected. Keith always thought that Lance wore his emotions on his sleeve for the whole world to see. Keith thought that Lance was as easy to read as a picture book for grade schoolers. But... it was clear that he was wrong this whole time.

 

It was _clear_ that he didn’t know Lance at all, not like the way he thought he did anyways. All those times Lance reached for any possible excuse to say he was better than Keith… suddenly the drive behind it all wasn’t just because Lance was an annoying, cocky jerk.

 

No, it was because he felt like he _needed_ to.

 

Keith’s eyes fell to his feet, taking in this realization. He allowed himself a moment to consider this new information before looking back up at Lance, who now had his face buried in his knees.

  


How dare him. How _dare_ Lance think that he’s worthless. How could he possibly believe that about himself?!

 

Didn’t he realize how essential he was to the team? Didn’t he realize that without him, they wouldn’t be able to form Voltron?

 

Didn’t he realize how important he was to Keith?

 

Keith felt his frustration return again, but this time with a fierce urge to change Lance’s mind.

 

He found himself moving towards Lance, sitting down next to him, and staring at the floor in front of his feet. Keith couldn’t find the words he needed to help Lance. He wished Shiro were here. Shiro would know what to say.

 

Shiro would know how to motivate Lance. That was just something that Shiro could do. It was something that made him a great leader.

 

Keith felt so helpless.

 

He tried to think about something that could possibly make Lance feel better, but all that came to mind was just how he felt about Lance. Just the overwhelming fondness he had for the blue paladin. Keith knew he couldn’t just _say_ all that, it would give him away.

 

Considering his words for a moment, Keith decided on what he should say.

  


“Lance… I don’t think you’re pathetic. I think… you’re very strong for being able to find it in yourself to tell me all this”.

 

It came out more forced than he intended to. Keith just hoped that Lance would believe him.

 

Lance looked up at Keith, frowning in uncertainty. The red paladin must look uncomfortable, because well, he _was_ uncomfortable. This wasn’t a problem he could tackle head on like a galra sentry or something he could maneuver around while flying in his lion. This was something different. Keith was out of his element.

 

He wished there was a way to just defeat Lance’s sorrow.

 

Lance met Keith’s eyes, searching them for something. The eye contact made his heart stutter, and he had to look away. The back of his neck felt like it was burning.

 

He heard Lance sigh beside him after a moment. Out of the corner of his eye, Keith could see the blue paladin tilt his head up to look at the blue lion.

 

“I know that….it’s important I switch lions so we can form Voltron… it’s just...” he spoke softly. Keith turned his head to look back over at Lance, listening.

 

Something in the other boy’s expression changed. He looked so fragile, like he could shatter into a bunch of tiny pieces at any moment.

 

“It’s just… we found her on Earth. She’s… she’s one of the last connections I have left to home and-” his voice was tightening with emotion, and Lance’s eyes began to water again. Tears spilled over his cheeks like tiny streams running down the side of a cliff, dripping off the base of his chin and seeping into the fabric of his jacket. Keith wanted nothing more than to see those tears disappear.

 

“I just- I-I just-... I miss Earth _so much, Keith_ ” Lance croaked, voice breaking with anguish. The boy buried his face into his knees again, hugging his legs tighter to his chest. The sound of metal shifting made Keith tear his eyes away from Lance and up at the blue lion.

 

She had curled her tail around her paws, trapping the two underneath her as if to protect them from the outside world. It felt like such a motherly gesture that Keith himself felt a wave of safety and security wash over him. It was breathtaking.

 

The lion was looking down at the two paladins, glowing yellow eyes standing out against her faintly shadowed form. Noticing there was a blue light shimmering around them, Keith realized that the blue lion had even activated her shield too.

 

Lance’s quiet sob brought the red paladin’s attention back down to his hurting teammate.

 

He hated seeing Lance like this. It wasn’t right. Wasn’t natural. He wanted Lance to smile again. But he didn’t know _how_ to get that to happen.

 

Keith thought back to Shiro again, wondering what he would do in this kind of situation.

 

Shiro would… offer his teammate comfort and support, right? That wasn’t exactly Keith’s strong suit, but…

  


“Lance,” reaching out, Keith rested a hand on his teammate’s shoulder. The other boy looked up a little, eyes watery and puffy.

 

“Come here” Keith demanded once he had Lance’s attention, holding his other arm out. Lance raised a questioning eyebrow at the red paladin. “What are you doing?” he mumbled.

 

“What does it look like, jerk? I’m giving you a hug. Come here” Keith huffed with a pout, cheeks lighting up a little in embarrassment.

 

Lance blinked with both eyebrows raised, looking from Keith’s face, to his arms, to his chest, to the blue lion, and back again. He was hesitating, but after seeing that Keith didn’t lower his arm and continued to lightly tug at his shoulder, Lance must’ve realized that the other boy was being serious.

 

“Uhm...okay”

 

Lance scooted closer, and Keith adjusted himself so he was facing Lance more. Lance hesitated again real briefly before leaning in, allowing Keith to wrap his arms around the lankier boy.

 

It was awkward at first, because Keith felt so unused to having to offer this kind of support, and Lance probably didn’t even think Keith was _capable_ of offering this kind of support. Their hug was tense with uncertainty and Keith was beginning to wonder if he was even helping.

 

But then...something changed. Because suddenly Lance was hugging back and burying his face into Keith’s shirt. Keith blinked, caught off guard by the sudden warm press of Lance’s body against his own and the soft tickle of his breath against his arm.

 

It spurred Keith to wrap his arms around Lance tighter, holding the blue paladin firmly against him. In that moment, Keith felt an emotion flood his senses, enveloping him in a thick haze of warmth.

 

It was protectiveness.

  


_‘I want to protect you’_ is what came to Keith’s mind when a quiet sob ripped through Lance’s body, causing his shoulder’s to tremble.

 

 

_‘I want to protect you’_ is what Keith thought when he felt the warm wetness of Lance’s tears dampen his shirt where his face was buried.

 

 

_‘I want to protect you’_ is what Keith felt as he leaned the two of them back against the blue lion’s paw, pulling his legs closer in and crossing his ankles behind Lance’s body, burying his own face into Lance’s hair.

 

 

“I want to protect you” is what Keith murmured against the top of Lance’s head, but it was quiet as a whisper and muffled by the other boy’s hair.

 

He wasn’t sure if Lance could even hear him above the sobs that were raking through his body. If he could, he didn’t respond. Lance only continued to weep into Keith’s shirt, clutching the red paladin desperately like he was his only lifeline.

  
  


They sat like that for a long time. Keith wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but eventually Lance calmed down. His sobs faded into quiet sniffles while Keith continued to keep his face pressed against the top of Lance’s head, reveling in the physical contact with the blue paladin that he didn’t know how much he wanted until now.

 

Keith was fully aware of the warmth that was blooming in his chest. He didn’t want to allow his affection for Lance to grow any stronger than it already has, but he honestly couldn’t help it at this point. This was a side of Lance he’s never seen before. A fragile, scared, hurting side of Lance that Keith wanted to defend.

 

He would defend Lance, if the other boy would let him do so.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> update: wow! there's a picture now! i decided to draw this scene since writing it shattered me lmao. you can reblog the picture over here on me blog <3 http://sniperlance.tumblr.com/post/158009838712/i-want-to-protect-you-a-scene-from-my-black


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> you thought the angst was over? think again :'D

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HEYO I'M BACK WITH ANOTHER CHAPTER. sorry about the delay, i realized that i had kinda rushed into this fic without enough story planning involved before hand. But! good news is that i've got a whole lot more fleshed out now, so i should be able to update more often. i'm gonna try to aim for a two week limit on updates, and you can always check my blog for any news on when the next chapter will be out. i'll always make a post once i know the time i plan to have the next chapter out, so yeah.
> 
> and also, THANK YOU SO MUCH AGAIN FOR ALL THE POSITIVE FEEDBACK. i'm honestly so happy that you guys are enjoying this fic, because i sure as heck am enjoying writing it! i've got a whole lot of story planned for this, so i hope you can stick with it :'D  
> ALSO ALSO, PLEASE CHECK OUT THIS AMAZING FANART SOMEONE DID FOR THIS FIC BECAUSE I'M STILL CRYING OVER IT AND PROBABLY WILL FOR A LONG TIME LMAO: (1) https://futureblackpaladin.tumblr.com/post/158507030298/his-heartbeat-raged-alongside-the-twisting-and  
> (2) https://futureblackpaladin.tumblr.com/post/158507022998/allura-reacted-with-quiet-anger-her-hatred-for
> 
> and as always, thank you my betas for helping proof read and brainstorm ideas with me! you guys are awesome and really help me stay reassured!
> 
> enjoy the chapter!!!

 

 

It took a moment for Lance to register what Keith was doing.

 

He was actually surprised. He didn’t expect this to come from the red paladin, but…

 

Lance scooted forward, allowing Keith to pull him into a hug. He was tense, Lance could tell that Keith was pushing himself outside his comfort zone. Up until Keith said he thought Lance was strong....Lance had been scared that Keith was only doing this because he had to.

 

Lance was afraid that Keith wouldn’t actually care. That this was just another problem he had to deal with. Another burden he had to shoulder. Lance hadn’t felt that sick with himself when he admitted he hated himself in a very, very long time. It was an emotion he constantly tried to avoid. A feeling he didn’t want to face.

 

Hate is a very strong, clear cut word. It suggests that you are at war with yourself, and in a way… Lance did feel like he was at war with himself. But he didn’t feel like it was something that fully described how he felt, he only said that on the impulse of his emotions. It was... more complex than that.

 

Yes, Lance boasted and bragged about himself. It was his coping method that he subconsciously developed long before he even became a paladin. Growing up in a large family meant that he had to compete for attention and praise from his parents, as he was a middle child.

 

He constantly set himself up on his own pedestal so he wouldn’t have to face how he truly feels, because he hated facing the painful truth.

 

See, Lance has always struggled with his self esteem. Worthlessness wasn’t a foreign emotion to him. So when he became a paladin, he could see the strengths everyone of his teammates had except for himself.

What exactly did Lance have? He could...shoot a gun, and fly his lion, but that’s all he could really think of. Everyone else actually contributed something useful to Voltron’s cause, but what did Lance _do?_

 

And if Lance left the blue lion? What would he contribute then? He couldn’t be the sharpshooter anymore, and he couldn’t fly his lion either. He really would be completely useless then. It was something that Lance didn’t want to accept. He wanted to believe that he was useful to the team, but it was already so hard to tell himself that.

 

He knew the way his teammates felt about him. He wasn’t that dense. They didn’t think that Lance was capable, didn’t they? Isn’t that why Shiro always picked Keith to go on missions with him instead of Lance?

 

Keith was better than Lance, right? Even Shiro thought so. That’s why Keith would pilot the black lion. That’s why Lance was only Keith’s replacement. It was the only explanation Lance could come up with.

 

Though…Keith did say that he didn’t think Lance was pathetic. Did he really mean that?

 

Lance had searched Keith’s face for any sign of scorn or mockery, because his brain always liked to pull the ol’ “that sounds fake, but ok” thing on him when it came to people actually praising him... but he only found hesitant sincerity in the other boy’s eyes.

 

Maybe... Maybe Lance was wrong?

 

Maybe this whole time he thought Keith looked down on Lance like he was just an annoying, cocky runner-up… but in reality that wasn’t really the case?

 

It confused him. Why would Keith think that? He’s supposed to be Lance’s rival, right? Of course, they were teammates and all, and Lance did consider Keith a...friend. Sorta. But- it didn’t really make sense to Lance.

 

Lance’s brain again toyed with the idea that Keith was only being nice to him because he had to, so they could get back to forming Voltron as soon as possible. It would make sense, after all they are kinda in the middle of a war right now and have a million other more important things they should be worrying about rather than Lance being sad.

 

However, when Lance felt Keith’s arms wrap around his frame, pulling him into a hesitant embrace… it occurred to the blue paladin that Keith must _really_ be trying to comfort him right now. Because- Keith never hugged anyone. It was only something that people who were close to him- aka Shiro- were privileged enough to receive, and even then Lance rarely saw Keith hug Shiro.

 

The dawning realization hit Lance full force, like the sun breaking through thick rain clouds above, and he felt another wave of emotions come crashing down on his fragile heart.

 

Keith meant what he said. And now he was going the extra mile to comfort Lance when he didn’t even _need to_. Lance couldn’t hold back his sobs anymore, and the dam walls he had spent trying to repair from his outburst earlier came crashing down again under the sheer force of his unbridled emotions.

 

Clinging to the other boy, he cried. And cried. And cried.

 

Lance cried until he felt like he couldn’t cry anymore. Everything over the past three days that had been numbed by his emotional dissociation came rushing to him like a flash flood of muddy, dirty water. The battle against Zarkon, Shiro’s disappearance, seeing his team -his _family_ \- nearly fall apart right before his eyes and not having the mental capacity to really be there for them when they needed _him the most_ -

 

Lance was falling apart in Keith’s arms. If he weren’t currently having an emotional breakdown, maybe he’d make a snarky comment on how the red paladin was actually being patient with something for once. Right now, he was so wrapped up in just feeling _terrible_ that he didn’t notice the warm breath seeping through his hair from Keith’s nose until Lance’s sobs became nothing more than pitiful sniffles and breath hitches.

 

Keith had adjusted their position so he was leaning back against the blue lion while Lance was slightly pulled up onto his abdomen. It was a comfortable position, the red paladin staying true to his element by feeling warm against Lance’s chilled body.

 

The rise and fall of Keith’s chest and his arms firmly pressed against Lance’s back was enough to lull the boy into a some-what calmed state. His head hurt from the amount of water he released from his eye ducts, but at least he wasn’t crying anymore. He felt drained, tired, and wanted nothing more than to just fall asleep right then and there.

 

But Lance knew better. Keith probably wouldn’t appreciate Lance falling asleep on him. It was bad enough his black shirt was now soaked with tears and snot and saliva from the blue paladin’s open mouth sobs.

 

So, with much reluctance, Lance pulled away from Keith. For a split second, Lance swore it felt like Keith’s arms tightened around his shoulders in protest. But as Lance sat back on his heels, Keith’s arms fell from the other boy’s body and he adjusted himself so he was sitting up straight.

 

The red paladin looked up at Lance, face full of some of the most rawest concern Lance has ever seen Keith express. Lance forced himself to look away, biting his lip uncomfortably.

 

Well. This was awkward.

 

“Uhm… Sorry” was all Lance could say. His throat felt raw from all the crying he had just done, and his voice reflected that with a gravelly croak.

 

“Don’t apologize” Keith replied, adjusting his jacket so that it sat on his shoulders correctly. Lance’s eyebrows dipped even lower.

 

“Your shirt is all gross now” He muttered, running a hand through his hair. His cheeks were already flushed from crying, but he could still feel them heat up a little in embarrassment.

 

Keith looked down at his dampened shirt, and shrugged. “Whatever”.

 

Lance’s eyes shot back to Keith, eyebrow raising in question. “You don’t care?”

 

The other boy gave him a blank look in return, the kind of look that never gave anything away. “I’ll just wash it later”.

Lance watched Keith for a moment before glancing over his shoulder, at the blue lion. At the open space that stretched throughout the lion chamber. He felt a twinge shoot through his stomach.

 

Keith seemed to read his thoughts, because he spoke up then, regaining Lance’s attention.

 

“We don’t have to go back yet if you’re not ready”.

 

Swiveling his head back around to the other boy, Lance silently thanked Keith for being so considerate. He crawled a little closer to Keith and plopped down next to him, sitting back against Blue’s giant metal paw. Lance was close enough so that their shoulders were touching, but that was all the remaining physical contact they shared. A big sigh left Lance’s lungs and he leaned his head against Blue, relishing in the cool metal against his burning neck.

 

The two sat there in silence for several dobashes. Thousands of unspoken thoughts raced through Lance’s head as he looked up at Blue, each one zipping by too quickly for him to dwell too long on it. He was worried about Shiro. He was worried about his _team._ How are they going to function like this now? With Shiro missing?

 

What about himself? How is Lance supposed to help them when he could barely hold himself together? He should be stronger than this. He’s always been able to put on a brave face for his team, always been able to crack a joke to lighten the mood, always been able to take the brunt of the blow when they were in trouble.

 

Was it his fault? Was the rumbling storm that echoed in his head and muted his liveliness the reason for the horrible tension that never seemed to leave the air and hung like rainclouds over everyone’s heads?

 

Why can’t he be there for his team?

 

Why can’t-

 

“Okay, the shirt is a little gross” Keith said suddenly.

 

...Why can’t Keith just let Lance wallow in his self pity??

 

“I thought you said you didn’t care!” Lance gaped, offended. He turned to look at Keith with eyebrows furrowed. The red paladin was tugging at the black fabric of his shirt so that it wouldn’t come in contact with his skin.

 

“I care a little...” Keith mumbled, glancing at Lance from the corner of his eye. The blue paladin zeroed in on the slight uptick of the other boy’s mouth, which suggested that he was trying to hold back a smirk. _Keith, you little shit._

 

Lance crossed his arms and turned his head away, pointing his nose upwards. “Well, now you get to wear that gross shirt with my slobber all over it for the next who knows how many hours, so sucks to be you!”

 

He heard the faint chuckle that purred in Keith’s chest, and it did weird things to the blue paladin’s heart.

 

There was another few beats of silence, and Lance kept his arms crossed, head turned away. Now that he was pulled back into the present thanks to Keith’s totally not necessary comment, Lance suddenly felt hyper aware of his shoulder which was still pressed against the red paladin’s.

 

“Uh… can I ask you something?” Keith spoke up again. Lance looked back to Keith, eyes narrowing in suspicion. “If you’re going to ask me to trade you shirts, it’s not happening”.

 

The other boy blinked in surprise at Lance’s accusation. “Wh- no I wasn’t- I was going to ask you about your family”.

 

“You- wait….oh” Lance trailed off, realizing it was nothing but a harmless question.

 

He was always happy to talk about his family, he loved them immensely. Back at the Garrison, he’d write to them all the time, talking about all the cool things he’s gotten to do as a fighter pilot, all the new people he’s met at the Garrison…

 

“What did you want to ask?” Lance finally said, unfolding his arms and letting them fall to his sides. Keith fidgeted with the hem of his gloves idly, and shrugged. “I’m just...curious about them” He murmured.

 

And so, Lance told him. He told him all about his family. His parents, how many siblings he had,   his nieces and nephews, extended family, even close friends he had back home who he considered family. Lance told Keith all about them. The red paladin sat there, legs crisscrossed and arms crossed in his lap, listening intently to the other boy ramble on for nearly an entire varga. Laughing when it was appropriate, somber faced when it was fitting, Keith listened.

 

Eventually, Lance trailed off after finishing up a story about his older brother, sighing wistfully. He felt better, comfortable with the warm fondness swirling around in his head as he thought about the family he completely adored.

 

It occurred to him that he didn’t know much about Keith’s family. He doesn’t remember Keith ever talking about them… suddenly Lance was feeling curious too.

“What about you? What’s your family like?” Lance asked, arms crossed behind his head. His ramble about his family relaxed him enough to feel comfortable, probably the most comfortable he’s felt in several quintents. Keith on the other hand, stiffened beside the blue paladin. It caught Lance’s attention.

 

“Keith?” Lance tilted his head, studying his teammate.

 

“Uh, I’m kinda. An orphan” he said, frowning a little. Lance’s mouth dropped open in instant regret as he pulled his arms out from behind his head. _Quiznack, I forgot about that!_

 

“Shoot- ah- sorry, I forgot. Nevermind” Lance stuttered. Heat creeped up on his cheeks in embarrassment as he fluttered his hands uselessly out in front of himself. _God, I’m an idiot._

 

Keith scooted around, facing Lance, and his arms shot up in dismissal. “No- no, it’s fine! I just don’t talk about it very much so I understand why you wouldn’t remember” he said quickly. Lance bit his lip nervously, unable to meet eye contact. Just when he was starting to feel relaxed again too…

 

“I uh, I don’t really remember a whole lot about my parents. Shiro is the only person I’ve ever really considered like family…”

 

Lance looked back to Keith, mouth parted slightly. The red paladin had his eyes trained on the floor in front of him, rubbing at the palms of his gloved hands with his fingertips. The realization dawned on Lance then- and he felt a somber feeling come over him.

 

Shiro was the only person Keith ever felt was like family. Shiro, the person who went missing for a second time three days ago. Shiro, the person who might be…

 

Lance instantly felt resolve wash over him. He was going to be Keith’s family, and so was their team. In fact- Lance would bring Keith home to his own family back in Cuba at the end of all this if he really had to. Anything to make sure that Keith knew there were people who cared about him, people who would support him, people who would watch his back and look after him. Lance would make sure of it. He didn’t care if they were rivals, nobody deserved to feel _that_ alone.

 

Lance didn’t know what to think of Shiro’s disappearance. He knew that they had to face the possibility that Shiro was dead, but he didn’t really know what to believe. Either way, it didn’t matter to him right at this very moment.

 

“Maybe when we’re all done with this ‘saving the universe’ thing, you can come meet my family” Lance said, watching the other boy closely. Keith looked up then, surprised at such an offer. “Really?”

 

“Yeah! Dude, they’d totally love you. My mamá would probably immediately adopt you. She’d be like “oh, mi hijo! Who is this sweet boy you brought to us? He’s so handsome!”” Lance’s voice pitch went up as he let his native accent come back for a moment to mimic his mother’s voice. Keith smiled a little bashfully, probably imagining meeting Lance’s mom.

 

“She’s a great cook and gives the best hugs ever, and my papá is really funny and easy to get along with, you’d love them. Once we finish taking down the Galra, you can totally meet them” Lance continued excitedly, fidgeting where he was sitting just by the thought of it.

 

Keith let out a tiny laugh, and rubbed his forehead with the top of his hand. “I’ll hold you to that, then” he smiled.

 

Lance smiled back, feeling relieved that the red paladin would be okay with that. Lance was okay with it...he thought. He was pretty sure it would be okay. He still felt...a lot of conflicted emotions towards Keith, but his better half knew better than to let his teammate go on without experiencing what it’s like to have a family.

 

The two fell silent again. Keith was looking down, lost in thought, while Lance idly tapped his fingers against the floor. He was thinking about introducing Keith to his younger siblings when the red paladin spoke up suddenly.

 

“So uh, there’s another thing that I needed to talk to you about…”

 

Lance looked up at him, quirking an eyebrow. Keith fidgeted slightly. Uncomfortably. It spiked Lance’s curiosity tenfold. “Yeah?”

 

“Well,” Keith paused, hesitating for a moment. He looked back up at Lance, frowning again. “I wanted to talk about the lion reassignments…”

 

Ah.

 

Lance immediately crossed his arms and turned away, his stomach twisted anxiously as he closed himself off. “I still don’t want to do it” he muttered bitterly.

 

Keith’s frown deepened in desperation. “Lance I- I know you don’t want to do it, and I understand why now- but we have to be able to form Voltron and we can’t do that without the black lion…”

 

The blue paladin still didn’t feel convinced. He knew Keith was right, but the thought of having to leave Blue for _Keith’s_ lion, take _Keith’s_ place, as his _replacement_ made Lance’s skin crawl. Lance furrowed his brows uncomfortably, conflicting feelings making his heart beat faster.

 

Keith continued though.

 

“Besides, it’ll only be until we find Shiro. Once we find him, he can take the black lion back, I can go back to Red, and you can go back to Blue, and everything can go back to normal! It won’t be a permanent change”

 

Lance considered this. They didn’t know where Shiro was, or even if he was alive still, but…

 

If it really was just a temporary thing, Lance supposed he could do it. He wouldn’t like it, not one bit, but if they could find Shiro, and soon, then Lance wouldn’t have to pilot Red for very long.

 

...However, there was also the chance that Shiro was dead. Lance didn’t like thinking about it, but he knew he couldn’t avoid that possibility. The team had spent nearly _two days_ searching the castle head to toe for Shiro, scanning it over and over and _over_ for any sign of him, searched through the system for any pods that might have launched, tried to radio in his helmet through the intercom system, tried tracking his suit, even scanning for any sign of Galra technology on the ship in case they might of missed something. Each attempt turned up empty and gave Lance less and less hope as his emotions were put on autopilot to cope. Lance didn’t get any sleep during those two first days. It wasn’t until later that night on the second day after helping clear the Bridge of any hazardous castle debris lying about did Lance actually get to lay his head down and rest for a few hours.

 

It sounded ridiculous, to assume Shiro was dead just because he miraculously disappeared from the black lion without a trace, but nobody could come up with something else that was logically possible.

 

Lance’s mouth twisted into a tight frown, his decision wavering on the edge of a cliff with uncertainty.

 

“Uh… I know that… you feel like you’d just be replacing me, but…”

 

Lance looked up at Keith, who seemed to be struggling to find his words.

 

“Allura said that… the Red lion is the most difficult lion to fly, but I think… you can do it...” he mumbled awkwardly, hands balled into fists. Lance blinked.

 

For a moment, Lance felt butterflies suddenly take off in a swarming cloud in the pit of his stomach because of what Keith just said. Keith was encouraging him. He was. Telling Lance that he thinks he can do it. Pilot the most difficult lion there is to pilot. _Keith_ was saying that. The blue paladin felt something -a fondness for the black haired boy- deep inside his chest that he thought he’d buried a long time ago begin to swell and push against the tight walls Lance had built around it.

 

It spurred him to react to the situation immediately. He had to extinguish those flaming emotions before they could get out of control, otherwise it would be bad news for Lance.

So, Lance reacted with sarcasm. It was the only way he knew how to dissociate himself from his emotions.

 

“Wow… Keith is actually trying to encourage me? That’s new” Lance’s mouth pulled back in a smirk, and he cocked an eyebrow. His tone was dripping with tease.

The look on the red paladin’s face was priceless, eyes going wide and mouth dropping open, flabbergasted.

 

“Wh- Y- You’re- I’m just trying to be _nice,_ jerk!” Keith fumed, hands shooting out to his sides and his voice pitch rising to a crack. Lance grinned.

 

“Awwww, that’s adorable!” Lance clasped his hands and held them close to his head, sticking his bottom lip out and batting his eyelashes. Keith looked incredibly aggravated, cheeks flaming red in frustration and embarrassment. It was hilarious.

 

Lance’s composure was shattered when Keith gave him a shove to the shoulder and he couldn’t hold back his cackles anymore. He was dying. Not literally. Keith continued to shove at Lance’s shoulder while the other boy snorted and wheezed. It wasn’t until Keith let out an impatient grunt and gave Lance a strong enough shove that he fell over on his side did Lance finally collect himself to form a sentence.

 

“Pffsgh- heehehe- Okay okay! Ahah- Fine! Chill out Keith!” Lance giggled, batting away another shove from Keith with his hand. The boy folded his arms against his chest and gave Lance a pointed look.

 

The blue paladin sighed, smiling lightly. “I’ll do it”.

 

Keith just continued to look at him with a pout on his face. Lance’s expression turned suddenly serious and he pointed an exaggerated finger at Keith. “But that doesn’t mean I’ll like it” he said, deadpan.

 

He stared down Keith with a pout of his own for several ticks, somehow ending up in a staring contest. The red paladin’s mouth twitched, as if he was fighting down a smile. It made Lance’s own mouth uptick in a small smirk, also trying to hold his ground.

 

A few more ticks passed and suddenly Keith broke out into a fit of giggles, breaking the eye contact as he lowered his head and cradled his chest with his crossed arms. Lance grinned.

 

“Why are you laughing? I’m being serious here!” Lance mocked an annoyed tone, sitting up and leaning towards Keith. The other boy snorted. “I don’t even know. You’re weird”.

 

Lance scoffed, offended. “You’re weird!” he shot back.

 

Keith looked up at Lance through his bangs, eyes crinkling with his smile. “Well, you’re weirder” he laughed.

 

Lance felt another jolt shoot through his heart. “Oh yeah?! Well, you’re weirderd _er!_ ” he fired back on impulse. Keith snorted again and raised an eyebrow.

 

“Weirder-der?”

 

“Weirderdaderderder! Don’t make fun of my grammar!” Lance huffed and stood up. Keith giggled again and rolled his eyes fondly, pushing himself to his feet as well.

 

Lance scuffed his foot against the ground, fighting back the blush that was threatening to spread across his face. He was certainly _not_ thinking about how adorable Keith looked when he laughed. Absolutely not.

 

Looking back over his shoulder at the open lion chamber, Lance sighed. “I guess we should probably head back to the Bridge… I should probably apologize to everyone for yelling…” He trailed off, eyes falling to his feet. Keith nodded silently beside him.

 

Lance walked out from underneath the blue lion, who had moved her tail to allow him to pass. The blue paladin paused, resting a hand against Blue’s paw, looking up at her with a sigh.

 

“I’m really gonna miss the ‘ol girl, but I guess that’s just the way things are…” Lance trailed off, sadness returning to his features. He felt the familiar pangs of homesickness returning to his chest, much to his discomfort.

 

Keith set a gentle hand on Lance’s shoulder, gaining the other boy’s attention. “It’ll only be until we get Shiro back, I promise” he murmured. Lance stared back at him with an unreadable expression, watching Keith remove his hand and turn away, heading away from the blue lion.

 

It made Lance feel uneasy, how determined Keith was about Shiro. Yes, it was good to have hope, but too much hope could be dangerous, especially considering the world that Keith and Lance now lived in. When you are fighting a war, you have to be ready to face the fact that your teammates could die. You had to face the fact that _you_ could die. And… Lance knew this.

 

He wondered if Keith knew this.

 

Lance followed Keith across the lion chamber, waving goodbye to Blue and feeling a little creeped out by the way all the lions except for Black seemed to be watching Keith and Lance. Before they made it to the door, the blue paladin stopped.

 

“Keith, wait…”

 

The other boy stopped too, glancing over his shoulder. “Yeah?”

 

Lance fidgeted with the ends of his jacket sleeves nervously. “I, uh, er…. Sorry for- about this” he gestured to nothing in general with his hands, glancing off to the side.

 

“...Don’t worry about it” Keith responded. Lance didn’t feel like he said enough, however.

 

“I know I said a lot of things and… probably overshared a whole lot, but…”

 

Keith turned to fully face Lance, voice more authoritative than before. “Lance, don’t worry about it”.

 

“I don’t hate you” Lance finished, exhaling deeply. There was a beat of silence before Keith smiled faintly.

 

“I know”.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Back at the Bridge, Allura, Coran, and Kolivan were up by the dashboard, discussing things in quiet voices. Pidge and Hunk sat on one of the set of steps, Pidge leaning against Hunk comfortably. She idly toyed with a small Olkarian fidget cube that Ryner made for her back on Olkarian, running her thumb over the tiny buttons placed next to each other rapidly and enjoying the clicking sounds they produced.

 

Slav had retired to his room a while ago, Allura finally being fed up with him and dismissing him from the Bridge. Everyone had been relieved. Even Kolivan, who started losing his own patience as well. Pidge wasn’t sure what the other three were discussing now, she lost interest soon after Slav left. He may be incredibly annoying, but his mind was actual brilliance and Pidge took a fascination to the upgrades he suggested to the ship, especially the Gravity Jumper, which was a type of modern day intergalactic space traveling engine that allowed ships to travel incredible distances through space, similar to the wormholes the ship used. It involved the manipulation of gravity, powered by a special type of element found in the dense, rocky shards of a Kulvealien planet’s core. It amazed Pidge to no end.

 

But Pidge wasn’t so focused on that right now. She was starting to get worried about Keith and Lance being gone for so long now. It must have been nearly three hours since Lance left earlier that morning. Pidge felt uneasy, had begun pacing, and Hunk finally offered to sit with her. He too was worried.

 

“Do you think we should go check on them?” Pidge asked, clicking away at her fidget cube. Hunk looked down at the green paladin, obvious worry lines showing on the brow of his forehead. Despite himself, he answered calmly with a hint of casualness.

“I’m sure they’re fine. I mean, the worst that could happen is they got into another fight and broke up”.

 

Pidge snorted, looking up at Hunk with a raised eyebrow. “But they’re not dating?” she stated. Hunk shrugged, looking back up at the Bridge windows. “They act like they are though”.

 

“...True”

 

“Not gonna lie though, I am worried about them. Lance seemed really upset” He continued, frowning a bit. Pidge watched Hunk for a moment before looking back down at her cube. “What do you think he meant by… what he said earlier?” the smaller paladin mumbled.

 

Hunk’s eyes lowered to his feet and he rested his chin in his hands, elbows on his knees. “Lance kinda has some issues with Keith, in case you couldn’t tell already. I just hope they’re able to talk things about, I know they really need it…”

 

Pidge nodded, eyebrows dipping again in concern for her friends. As if on cue, the sound of the Bridge doors opening caught the two paladin’s attention, and they turned their heads to see who had come. Hunk stood up immediately, smiling in greeting. “Lance! Keith! You’re back!”

 

By the sound of Hunk’s greeting, Princess Allura, Coran, and Kolivan all three turned their heads to see the newcomers walking in. Pidge scrambled to her feet in relief.

 

“Hey guys…” Lance smiled at his team as he approached. There was a faint shadow of weariness on his features, he looked exhausted. Keith looked tired too, but not nearly as worn out as the blue paladin.

 

The team crowded around Lance and Keith, except for Kolivan, who hung back and watched the group from where he stood. Pidge wiggled her way to the front, looking up at the two paladins with big eyes. “Are you okay? Did you work it out??”

 

Lance exchanged a look with Keith before turning back to Pidge, and the rest of the group. “Yeah, we made up. We’re all good now” he replied, smiling a little.

 

Before anyone could say anything, Lance took a small step forward, clearing his throat.

 

“I wanted to uh, say I’m sorry for yelling earlier…” Lance trailed off, eyes darting to the side uncomfortably. Hunk stepped forward and rested a big hand on his shoulder comfortingly, smiling warmly. “Hey, it’s alright man! You’re stressed out, we’re all pretty stressed out right now. Don’t feel bad for feeling bad”.

 

Lance looked up at his friend and returned the smile, placing one of his own hands on Hunk’s that was on his shoulder. “Thanks, buddy”.

 

“Hunk is right, I think we all can agree that things have been very hard for us recently. Change is not something that...everyone can adapt to right away” Allura spoke up, crossing her hands behind her back.

 

Pidge doesn’t miss the brief glance that Allura gave Keith.

 

“It’s true, and perfectly understandable to be upset. But I am certainly glad that the two of you were able to make up!” Coran piped up, patting Keith on the shoulder.

 

Lance nodded, glancing at the red paladin again before turning to Allura.

 

“I should probably tell you that I’ll, uh, go through with the… lion re-assignments” he said, meeting Allura’s eyes earnestly. The Princess smiled gently, placing a hand on his other shoulder. “I know that it is hard, Lance. You have every right to feel upset. A bond between a lion and it’s paladin cannot be so easily broken. I am terribly sorry that these are the circumstances…”

 

Lance lowed his eyes, tears starting to well in them despite his tight smile. “It’s alright…”

 

The sight broke Pidge’s heart. She hated seeing her teammate hurt like this. Moving closer to Lance, she pulled him into a tight hug, wanting to express that she was here for the blue paladin. Hunk immediately joined in, scooping the both of them up into a big Hunk Hug. Lance let out a small laugh and hugged back, burying his face in Hunk’s shirt.

 

Hunk smiled, holding the two paladins in his arms, and after a moment he looked up at Coran and Allura. “C’mon guys, get in on this. I think we all seriously need a hug right now”

 

The Alteans exchanged a look and Coran shrugged, smiling cheerfully as he joined in on the hugging action. Allura joined immediately after, chuckling a bit. Hunk turned his head to look at Keith, who kinda stood there off to the side awkwardly. “That includes you too, Keith” he winked.

 

Keith fidgeted a bit, not really sure what to do until Coran grabbed him by the arm and pulled him into the group hug.

 

Everyone was silent as the sound of Lance’s quiet sniffles drifted into the air, floating through the air and carrying all the way back to Kolivan, who stood back from the group, watching with an unreadable expression.

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> by the way, i updated the tags! be sure to look over them!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which lance is still an angsty boi, blue is adorable, and red is salty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh boy, here we are with another chapter. i had a lot of fun writing this one, because now we're actually going somewhere with the plot! this chap is gonna be a little bit longer than the previous ones  
> thank you again for all the wonderful comments! your support means so much to me, you have no idea <3
> 
> also, i may or may not have made a short animatic for the first two chapters of this fic, you can watch it here: http://sniperlance.tumblr.com/post/158581960413/its-3-am-and-i-should-be-sleeping-yet-here-i-am
> 
> come scream at me about black paladin lance on my blog over at Sniperlance.tumblr.com!
> 
> and finally, thanks again to my wonderful betas for helping me out! :D

 

 

After the team group hug, Allura had told the paladins to go get some rest for a few hours. It had been a very stressful day, and everyone was exhausted. Everyone has _been_ exhausted for the past three days. It was only about eleven A.M. castle time, and Lance felt like he could sleep for quintents. Saying his goodbyes to the rest of the team, Lance headed back to his quarters.

The blue paladin flopped onto his bed as soon as he entered his room, not even bothering to remove his jacket. He lazily kicked off his shoes, which landed somewhere on the floor, and snuggled into his bed. He was so tired that he didn’t even try to pull the blanket over himself, he just wanted to close his eyes and shut the rest of the world out for a while. Let himself drift off into the sweet, sweet promise of sleep.

 

Sighing, Lance let his eyes close as the bedroom lights dimmed down automatically to encompass the room in a gentle darkness.

 

He found, however, that sleep wouldn’t come so easily to him. As soon as his eyes shut, he could already hear a whirlwind of thoughts racing through his head, replaying the events of today and the past couple days over and over again like a broken record. So much has happened, so much that Lance still hasn’t really managed to process yet. He felt so overwhelmed and just _tired._ He just wanted to sleep already.

 

Groaning, Lance sluggishly rolled over in his bed, trying to find a more comfortable position to lay in. As he moved, he felt himself roll onto something lumpy and soft which was followed by the sound of a squeak.

 

“Wha-?” Lance mumbled, rolling back over and sitting up. Looking down, he spied a small mouse tail peeking out from underneath the blanket. Surprised, Lance pulled up the blanket a little to reveal one the space mice curled up there, chittering indignantly at the covers being removed.

 

“Oh, hi Platt. Didn’t see ya there” the blue paladin smiled a little, reaching down and stroking the chubby yellow mouse on the head. Platt let out a content squeak at the pets, nuzzling into Lance’s hand.

 

Out of all of the space mice, Platt seemed to like Lance the most. Probably because Lance usually let Platt have some of his food goo whenever he ate. This led to the fluffy yellow mouse sometimes coming into his bedroom and sleeping on Lance’s bed, and even cuddling the blue paladin when it was during resting hours. It reminded Lance of his cats back home, how they loved Lance and always seemed to follow him around wherever he went.

 

Lance let the blanket drop back down on Platt before flopping back over on his side again. He felt a little comforted by the presence of the chuby space mouse, but the restless thoughts that buzzed in his head didn’t let up.

 

Eventually though, he did manage to drift off into a light, dreamless sleep.

 

When he woke, Lance felt like he barely slept at all. His head pounded and throbbed with a headache, eyes feeling dry and burned when he blinked. The blue paladin didn’t bother moving from his spot. He felt like he didn’t have the willpower to do it. He figured he could just stay there until he heard the princess call everyone down to the lion chamber. Lance felt his chest tighten anxiously at the dreaded lion re-assignments.

 

What if he couldn’t connect with Red? What if Red didn’t like him? What if Red flat out rejected him and then he would be without a lion? He wouldn’t even be able to be a paladin anymore, because Allura would have the blue lion. The team would probably have to find another replacement for Red after all. Maybe they’d decide to kick Lance out, send him back to Earth because he couldn’t even pilot a lion anymore, let alone defend the universe.

 

They don’t need a seventh wheel like Lance sticking around, burdening them.

 

_‘They don’t need me’_ Lance thought, curling in on himself. If he thought that he had done enough crying today, he was very wrong. The blue paladin felt tears beginning to prick at the corners of his eyes, vision blurring. Squeezing his eyes shut, Lance buried his face into his pillow and sniffled.

 

His pillow was warm from the body heat that had seeped into it from his nap. Lance was reminded of Keith then, how he hugged Lance and allowed the boy to weep into his chest earlier that morning. Lance didn’t want to admit that he wished he could do it again, only this time he wouldn’t be crying. He remembered how warm Keith’s hug felt, the sound of his heartbeat and soft breath in Lance’s hair that had calmed the blue paladin. He felt so vulnerable with his emotions so open and bare to Keith, but with the other boy’s strong arms wrapped around Lance’s shoulders, he couldn’t help but feel secure.

 

It was the most intimate thing Lance has ever done with Keith. Thinking about it made the boy’s heart flutter. Lance knew that he shouldn’t be letting himself indulge in such thoughts, because he already told himself a long time ago that he wouldn’t ever have a shot with the red paladin, but those buried feelings of affection for Keith was the only positive emotion he was feeling right now. Lance couldn’t help himself. He was the moth and Keith was the flame, drawing him in dangerously close with this new side of tenderness that Lance never knew Keith had.

 

He thought back to when he sat with Keith in the lion chamber, the way the other boy laughed at the stories Lance told about his family, that genuine giggle Keith had over Lance’s silliness, the gentle smile he had when he listened to Lance talk… it could almost be mistaken for fondness. The blue paladin felt so weak.

 

Keith’s incredible piloting and combat skills Lance could put up with. He could just take out his internal conflicts on their rivalry. Keith’s hotheaded temper? Lance could handle that, he had no problem with the petty banter he got into with the red paladin. It was actually fun for the most part.

 

Keith showing gentle tenderness and encouraging Lance despite being horribly awkward? Well, that was a whole ‘nother story.

 

Lance cursed when he noticed how warm his face felt. Rolling onto his back, he glared up at the ceiling, a blush warming his cheeks. “I shouldn’t be doing this” the boy groaned. _I shouldn’t be letting myself get attached._

 

It wasn’t like Keith was interested anyways. Lance suspected that the red paladin had a thing for the princess, if he even was interested in relationships at all. That midnight stroll the two took in the pod that one night was proof enough to Lance.

 

_Ugh._ Why should Lance care anyways? He shouldn’t care, that’s why. It didn’t matter. It _shouldn’t_ matter. Lance knew that. Keith was far too out of his league and they would never be more than friends. Teammates. Lance was fine with this. He could ignore it, worry about bigger problems right now.

 

Lance pressed the palms of his hands against his eyes, groaning again. Platt poked his head out from underneath the blanket upon noticing that Lance was awake, chittering curiously.

 

The storm inside Lance’s mind hasn’t seemed to of let up yet. Lance hated this, feeling so out of control with his emotions. He was usually was able to keep himself stable, he could always brush things off and ignore the bad feelings. It wasn’t a problem.

 

But why was it so hard now? At the worst possible time, too? He had to be strong for his team. He had to be there for them, because they were hurting too. Lance recalled the way Pidge reacted to Shiro’s disappearance again, how frustrated and helpless the green paladin looked. Seeing Pidge break down like that made Lance’s heart break for his friend. Pidge was always someone that Lance looked to for strength when he himself started wondering if he’d ever see his family again. The younger paladin’s unwavering determination to find her family honestly inspired Lance to keep going. Keep fighting.

 

And Hunk, Lance knew that he was the one putting on the brave face this time. He had been the one to remain the most calm and collected, the one who tried his best to reassure everyone that it was going to be okay. Lance appreciated it, but he knew his friend was just as scared as Lance.

 

What were they supposed to do without Shiro? How could they possibly function now that the balance between the team had been shifted?

 

And how would the the team work as Voltron now that Keith would be in the black lion, making the final call on things? Would he let his reckless behavior rule what Voltron did? How would Allura handle being a leg? Lance trusted her capabilities, she was very smart and cunning, however she wasn’t as experienced in flying a lion as the rest of them. The team would likely have to rebuild itself up again, which would be difficult, Lance was sure.

 

Sighing, the blue paladin sat up in his bed, his worried thoughts coming full circle with the lion re-assignments. This whole situation was just a mess. Lance hated it.

 

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door, yanking Lance out of his storming thoughts. He wasn’t sure if he was in the mood to talk to anyone right now, but before he could say anything the door was already opening.

 

In came Coran, holding a plate of food goo and a water pouch with a bright smile on his face. The room’s lights responded to the movement and turned on, which Lance wasn’t prepared for. He squinted as the light flooded his hazy vision.

 

“Good afternoon, Lance! Did you sleep well? I brought something for you to eat, and drink! ‘Figured that you would be hungry after all that’s happened today” the cheery altean said, coming to stand by the bed and holding out the items to Lance. Blinking in surprise, he took the plate and water pouch from Coran.

 

“Oh… thanks Coran” Lance said as he set the plate and water pouch down beside him. It didn’t occur to him how hungry he was until now. All day he’s been focused on… other things to notice. Not only that, he figured part of the reason why he had such a terrible headache was because he was dehydrated from crying so much today. The blue paladin eagerly poked the straw into the water pouch and downed the whole thing right there as Coran watched with a parental kind of fondness.

 

“How long has it been?” Lance asked tiredly when he finished, trading the empty water pouch for the plate of food goo sitting next to him. Platt immediately was interested, crawling up into Lance’s lap and waiting for him to share.

 

“About four vargas” Coran said thoughtfully, tapping his chin with a pointer finger. Lance looked down at his plate a food, scooping up a spork full of the goo. “Oh”.

 

“Yep! Allura said that we will begin lion re-assignments here soon, so I wanted to come check on you and see how you were doing” the older altean continued, folding his arms behind his back. Lance looked up at him with the spork in his mouth. “Am m’okay” he mumbled around the sporkfull of goo. Though, he knew that wasn’t entirely true.

 

Coran seemed to pick up on that, taking a seat on the edge of Lance’s bed and folding his hands in his lap. “Lance, I know that you have been struggling with some internal conflict recently, maybe even longer than recently. And I may not know what is going on between you and Keith, but I just want you to know that if you ever need someone to confide in, you can always confide in me! I may be older, but with age comes wisdom after all!”

 

Lance felt his stomach twist uncomfortably, mainly because he didn’t exactly like talking about his negative emotions. He didn’t… think that his teammates really needed to know about that. He didn’t want to burden anyone with his personal insecurities, it was bad enough he ended up forcing Keith to deal with that, but…

 

Lance couldn’t help but remember what Keith said earlier, his words ringing in the back of the blue paladin’s head, clear as day.

 

_“Lance… I don’t think you’re pathetic. I think… you’re very strong for being able to find it in yourself to tell me all this”._

 

Keith saw strength in him. Strength in his ability to face his demons like that. It…was hard for Lance to admit how he felt, and to Keith of all people. Lance would never have considered it strength, because that was the weakest he’s felt in a really long time.

But Keith saw strength in him for it.

And what Lance got out of telling him? Support and compassion, unexpectedly. A better understanding of one another. Relief that telling someone how he felt didn’t backfire, in fact, it felt liberating to release some of that pressure that has built up inside of him over the months of fighting in a space war.

Opening up to his team, Lance realized, might not be as bad as he was expecting it to be, even if it was terrifying. Even if he thought they wouldn’t care, if they wouldn’t understand, if they would just confirm the doubts he already had in himself.

But Keith didn’t confirm those doubts. He did the exact opposite, actually. Maybe, maybe if Keith of all people could respect how Lance felt, then the rest of the team could too.

Lance could rise to that challenge, he figured. He was competitive at heart, after all.

And Keith thought Lance was strong. Now was his time to prove that.

Looking up at Coran again, Lance took a deep breath. “Well uh, I guess, I just have had a lot on my mind lately” he started, setting the spork down on the plate.

Coran listens quietly, expression calm and attentive. Lance has to pause for a moment, debating on what exactly he wants to tell the older altean. It’s true, there is a lot on his mind right now. He didn’t want to just dump all his problems on Coran… Lance would probably have another break down if he did that, and the last thing he wanted to do was _more_ crying.

 

“I just, the lion reassignments are really… y’know? I don’t want to do it” Lance sighed, looking down at the floor. Even if he agreed to letting Allura take his place, even if he agreed to take _Keith’s_ place… it didn’t mean he was happy with it. His hurt was still there. Pain doesn’t just go away like that, Lance’s unstable emotions wouldn’t settle down for the life of things, no matter how much he wished they would.

Coran nodded in understanding, looking on at the blue paladin sympathetically. Platt had looked up from munching on food goo, lowering his ears sadly.

 

“I understand that it’s hard, Lance. It isn’t something ideal that any paladin should have to do” Coran replied somberly. Lance looked back to him, frowning sadly. “And it’s not even just, having to _leave my lion either._ I just- having to pilot the red lion- it’s like- I’m like-...” Lance trailed off, lowering his eyes again and pulling his legs closer to himself.

 

“You feel like Keith’s replacement” Coran finished for him. Lance winced, remembering that he let that bit of information slip when he blew up at Keith that morning. He didn’t intend to say that… it just...happened. It was out of his control, the moment Keith had started getting up in Lance’s face. Lance didn’t think it was anyone else’s business how he felt about Keith, but he guessed he couldn’t change the past now. It was all said and done, and here Coran was addressing Lance’s feelings front and center. He could already feel his defenses starting to go up.

 

Lance didn’t respond, looking anywhere but at Coran, so the altean continued. “Is it alright if I ask why you feel that way, Lance?”

 

The blue paladin bit his lip. He wasn’t sure if he actually wanted to share the answer to that question. He already made a mess of himself earlier telling Keith- the source of that insecurity- about all that. He didn’t think he could handle bringing it back up again. He just… ugh. Why were his feelings so damn confusing and irrational?? Lance’s stomach churned anxiously and he felt his eyes starting to well up with frustrated tears.

 

“It’s alright if you don’t want to talk about it, lad” Coran sighed, patting Lance on the shoulder. “I don’t expect you to be ready to talk about all your feelings right away! Don’t feel like you have to, Lance”

 

Bless Coran. Bless him so much. Lance sighed in relief, relaxing his tensed shoulders a bit. He was pretty sure he wasn’t ready to prod an already bleeding wound in his emotional state. He just, he needed time.

 

“T-thanks Coran, I- ah, sorry, haha, I’m just, I don’t know, it’s been A Day” Lance laughed slightly in anxiousness, wiping the corners of his eyes with his jacket sleeve.

 

“Yes it has been indeed, and it’s still not over, unfortunately” Coran nodded, looking at the wall across from the side of the room they sat.

 

Lance idly scratched the top of Platt’s head while he shoveled another sporkful of food goo into his mouth, debating on what he wanted to say. Since they were on the topic of lions, he might as well bring up…

 

“I’m worried that, I won’t be able to pilot Blue anymore… if I switch to the red lion” Lance said after swallowing. Coran looked back to Lance, tilting his head in confusion. “Don’t be silly, lad! Of course you’ll still be able to fly your lion! A bond between a lion and paladin doesn’t just disappear like it never existed!” Coran exclaimed. Lance’s eyes widened in surprise, his mouth going slack. “It doesn’t?” he breathed, hesitant to believe it was true.

 

“Of course not! What, you think that lions just stop caring about their pilots? Hah! Don’t be ridiculous, Lance!” Coran laughed, patting the blue paladin on the shoulder. Lance looked down, processing this new found bit of information. “I just… thought that…” he trailed off.

 

“That the blue lion wouldn’t accept you as a pilot anymore?” Coran asked, crossing his arms. Lance looked back up at him, pulling half of his mouth back in a half frown and nodding a little. The altean met Lance’s eyes, and then sighed, closing his own. Reaching over, Coran rested a firm hand on Lance’s shoulder, a grounding, reassuring gesture.

 

“Lance, the blue lion is _your_ lion. A connection between a lion and her paladin cannot be so easily severed, not unless the lion itself wishes to cut the bond. Even if the lion has two paladins, it is the lion’s choice whether she wishes to end the connection or not. And I am positive that the blue lion would never wish to end her connection to you, lad”

 

Lance blinked at the older altean, absorbing this new information like a dry sponge. He felt so much relief in what Coran was telling him. This meant that… even if Lance had to pilot Red… he’d still have a connection to Blue. He’d still have a connection to Earth! He’d still… oh gosh, Lance was so _relieved._ He didn’t want to lose his bond with Blue, she was his. And he was hers.

 

Lance felt tears starting to well up in his eyes _again_ , what felt like the tenth time today. But at least this time it wasn’t because of a negative emotion. Lance sniffled, lips trembling as he tried to hold his composure. _Man, I’m such a cry baby today._

 

Coran rubbed Lance’s shoulder reassuringly, smiling at the blue paladin as he wiped his nose with his jacket sleeve. With a shaky breath, Lance collected himself and straightened up.

 

“Th-thanks for telling me that, Coran. I-... I was really, really worried about… that”

 

Coran’s smile brightened and he gave Lance another pat on the shoulder. “Of course, lad! I’m happy to help in any way, even if it’s just sharing a bit of info! I’m actually surprised the princess hadn’t told you that, yet”.

 

Lance nudged his food goo with his spork absently. “A lot has been going on, she probably forgot… which is fine, I don’t blame her” he said thoughtfully. Coran nodded, humming in agreement.

 

“Speaking of which! Allura is going to be calling everyone down to the lion chambers soon, I suggest finishing eating and straightening up a little bit. The day isn’t over quite yet!” the older altean patted Lance on the shoulder one more time before standing up, making his way over to door. Lance’s eyes followed Coran as he realized how much of a mess he must look like right now. Tear stained cheeks, uncombed hair, eyes ringed with red from all the crying… he really should fix himself up a bit. It might… make him feel better. Looking nice always made Lance feel at least a little better about himself.

 

Before Coran could leave, Lance stopped him with a “Coran, wait!”. The altean turned back to Lance, eyebrow raising curiously. Lance, scooting to sit on the edge of the bed, fidgeted with the ends of his jacket sleeves. “I just wanted to say… thanks, again” the blue paladin wasn’t sure why he felt awkward thanking Coran, but, he did. Lance supposed it was because Coran kinda reminded him of his father, back home on Earth. The older altean certainly had the spunky personality to fit the part.

 

Coran bid farewell to Lance after nodding, and then the paladin was left in his room alone again. Well, except for Platt, who was currently trying to get Lance to share more of his food goo. Lance decided, after finishing the plate, he would go take a much needed shower and clean himself up a bit. He’d take it as an opportunity to mentally prepare himself for what lay in store for him later on today.

 

He didn’t think he’d ever be ready for what he’d have to do.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Allura eventually did call everyone down to the lion chamber, and the blue paladin’s emotions seemed to go back on auto pilot mode again, to help him deal with the fluttering anxiousness in his gut. He had changed into his paladin armor, as did the others as well. Allura and Coran had explained to them that they didn’t have an extra set of black paladin armor for Keith to wear, so they wouldn’t be switching uniforms. Lance couldn’t help but feel glad, because for some reason it made him feel like… he was still connected to Blue in a way. It was a symbol of his role on the team as the _blue paladin_ , even if he wasn’t so sure of his role anymore...

 

Hunk and Pidge had already climbed on into their lions, waiting while Allura, Lance, and Keith went through with the reassignments. The two had offered their blue paladin friend words of encouragement and sympathy as Allura explained to them how this would go down. And now, Lance was standing over by the blue lion with the princess, about to give away his lion. One could say he was in the least bit excited.

 

“Well beautiful, ‘guess this is goodbye for now…” Lance sighed, patting Blue’s giant robotic paw. Princess Allura looked on at the blue paladin, smiling sympathetically at him with her hands clasped together. “It is a very brave thing to move to a new lion when you are already so closely bonded to one, Lance. I am proud of you”.

 

Lance perked an eyebrow, glancing at Allura with a blank look. He didn’t exactly… agree with that. He was only doing this because he had to, but he supposed that Allura was only trying to be encouraging, and he appreciated her kindness. Lance decided he didn’t want to dwell on those thoughts, though.

 

Smirking, Lance pointed a fingergun at the princess. “Oooh~, so you think I’m brave huh? I can’t blame you, I am pretty heroic~” he winked, making a clicking sound with his tongue. Allura wasn’t impressed, her expression going flat and unamused. What? Lance had to lighten the mood somehow.

 

Dropping his hand, Lance rubbed the back of his helmet, eyes shooting up to the blue lion again. He sighed a bit, scuffing his boot against the hangar floor. “Heh… but seriously, take care of her for me… okay?” his voice lowered a bit, faint sadness dripping off the tone in his voice. He looked back to Allura again, a small smile adorning his face.

 

She nodded, looking up at Blue with a determined light in her pretty eyes. “Of course” Allura hushed, visibly tensing. Lance’s smile dropped and he looked up at the blue lion too, giving her one last pat on her paw before taking several steps back.

 

Lance watched as Blue leaned down, giant muzzle resting close to the ground. Allura took a step forward, raising a hand to touch the mighty robot’s face.

 

He didn’t miss the way Allura’s hand shook ever so slightly, probably with a mixture of excitement and nerves.

 

As soon as Allura’s hand made contact with Blue’s muzzle, her hand lit up with a flash of a light blue, almost teal color, with faint traces of pink. The metal underneath her hand glowed a brilliant azure, glittering in soft contrast to Allura’s quintessence.

 

Lance watched in wonder as the princess drew her hand back quickly, drawing in a gasp as a new connection between her and the blue lion was opened. Lance felt it too, a new channel being opened up in his own connection to Blue. He couldn’t _really_ describe it, it almost felt like a second presence was there. He figured it must be Allura’s life force coming in through the bond he already shared with the blue lion. It was… surreal to say in the least.

 

The blue lion’s jaws opened then, allowing Allura a passage inside. Lance watches, speechless, as the princess doesn’t hesitate. With her head held high, Allura walks inside the blue lion, and Lance can’t help but feel a ripple of emotion wash over him. He isn’t sure how to place it, it feels like nostalgia mixed with jittery anxiousness and excitement as he is reminded of the first time he stepped inside the blue lion.

 

Blue stood, yellow eyes glowing brightly as she let out a deep mechanical growl. Lance snapped out of his small trance and took a few more steps back, once again blown away by just how huge the lions really were. He heard a crackle come on over the intercoms, followed by a voice. It was Hunk’s.

 

[“You alright, Princess?”]

 

There was a couple beats of silence before a response came.

 

[“Yes, I am!”] Allura answered with an excited giggle. Lance could feel the familiar bubble of excitement in his stomach reverberating off of the blue lion, the same one he felt when he first made his own connection with it. Blue was always the most hyper and energetic of the rest of the lions, always quick to excitement in the same way Lance was. It was what led to him taking the rest of the team on a wild space ride that first day he piloted Blue.

 

Lance couldn’t help but feel happy for Allura. Sure, he didn’t want to stop being Blue’s pilot, and he wasn’t sure if he liked the idea of having to share her now… but the blue lion was without a doubt the most fun lion to pilot. He was happy that the princess would be able to experience that now. He was happy that his new teammate was happy.

 

And Blue… well, he could feel her own happiness too. She was friendly, just like Lance. Easy to befriend, easy to make friends. It made sense that she was the most accepting of new pilots. The blue lion’s excitement shown in the way her tail lashed back and forth behind her, eager to take her new pilot out on a ride. But she knew that she had to wait, Lance could feel it.

 

[“Welcome to the pride, Allura!”] Pidge called over the coms. The royal altean answered back with more excited giggling, and Lance felt a smile creep up on his face. [“Thank you Pidge, this is certainly… something different!”] Allura said as the blue lion’s head turned to look over at the green one.

 

[“Good luck with her, Princess. She’s a real handful”] Lance said through the coms. Blue looked down at Lance, and he could sense a mock offended nudge come through his bond to Blue. Allura laughed again, this time at Blue’s fondness for her older paladin. [“I’ll do my best”] the princess murmured.

 

With a small smile and a salute, Lance said his goodbyes to the two before turning to look over in the direction of the red lion. Keith was standing there in front of it, waving his arms around in a wild gesture that Lance could only assume was frustration. He didn’t like the looks of that.

 

Taking a deep breath, the blue paladin made his way over to them, fists opening and closing nervously as he approached. As Lance got closer, he could hear Keith’s irritated voice come into range. His heart rate pick up anxiously.

 

“Uh, what’s going on?” Lance asked once he was close enough. Keith’s arms dropped to his side and he looked over at the blue paladin, clear impatience on his features.

He sighed, rubbing his visor with the back of his hand. “Nothing, just… she’s being difficult”.

 

Lance raised an eyebrow, looking up at the red lion curiously. Red appeared to be flat out ignoring Keith, what with the way her body language read. Head looking straightforward, tail curled over her paws indignantly, it was pretty obvious that she was not in a good mood.

 

Keith sighed again, looking back up at the red lion. “Look, I know that you don’t want to do this. I don’t want to either, but we _have_ to. It’s the only way we can form Voltron now” the red paladin growled impatiently.

 

Red looked down at him briefly, yellow eyes flashing, before she pointedly turned her head away again, as if she were scoffing. Lance couldn’t help but be a little amused by this.

 

“Wow… great to know I’m not the only one” Lance muttered, crossing his arms over his chest and looking away. He felt Keith shoot him a flat glare and allowed his mouth to curl slightly in a faint smirk.

 

“I promise that I’ll come back when we find Shiro, okay? Just, please go through with it?” Keith whined almost helplessly. Lance’s eyes drifted back over to him and Red, catching the way the giant mechanical lion’s tail flicked in irritation.

 

_‘Does the red lion not… want me?’_ Lance wondered with an anxious twist in his stomach. What if his doubts were right? What if the lion wouldn’t accept him as a new pilot? Her trust _was_ hard to earn after all. If she didn’t want him, then he wouldn’t be a member of team Voltron anymore- then he wouldn’t be useful at all! He’s just gonna be a seventh wheel- he’s just gonna be-

 

Keith’s voice cut through the paranoid thoughts that had begun to storm inside Lance’s head again. The blue paladin grit his teeth and tried to even out his breathing, listening to what the red paladin was saying desperately, as if his voice alone could ground him back to reality.

 

“C’mon, Red… it won’t be that bad…”

 

Red looked down at Keith again, and then turned her gaze to Lance. Lance felt himself freeze under her yellow stare, afraid that if he even moved an inch she would look away and out right reject him.

 

But after several ticks passed, Red looked back to Keith and almost visibly sighed. Lance watched in astonishment as she leaned down, muzzle setting down on the chamber floor. Keith raised a hand and pressed it against the lion’s metallic muzzle, lips curling into a small smile. “Thank you…” he murmured.

 

Then, Keith turned his head to look over his shoulder at Lance expectantly. The blue paladin felt his stomach jump anxiously as he realized what this meant.

 

Lance closed his eyes and took a deep breath, mentally preparing himself for what he was about to do. Opening his eyes, he exhaled and whispered “okay” to Keith. His heartbeat was racing as he stepped closer to the lion, and he could feel his knees starting to tremble as he reached a hand out, wincing as he placed his hand on the lion next to Keith’s.

 

Keith was watching him intently, eyes alit with a determined fire flickering in the depths of their inky blue pools. Lance met those eyes with his own, uncertain. Scared. He wanted to know what Keith was thinking right now, how he must feel about having to leave his lion too. Was it just as painful for him as it was for Lance? Did he have a chance to mourn his loss like Lance did? The blue paladin wondered if Keith even gave himself time to grieve for anything that has happened over the past couple days...

 

Keith broke the eye contact then, face turning back to the two paladin’s hands. Lance followed his gaze and watched as the red paladin pulled away, ultimately handing the red lion over to Lance.

 

Lance waited with baited breath for that connection to come. Waited for the Red lion to open up and bare her quintessence to Lance’s own. He wasn’t sure if it would work, because from what he knew, the red lion was _very_ different from Blue. lip tucked underneath his teeth, Lance waited.

 

Several ticks passed, and nothing happened. Lance was beginning to wonder if the red lion didn’t actually accept him, if this was just a trick to make him feel even worse about himself-

 

But then it happened.

 

The area around Lance’s hand lit up with a blazing red glow, clashing angrily with the intense blue that his hand gave off. He felt a sharp _zing_ of pain shoot up his arm and yanked it back, a broken yelp escaping his lips. Blue and red light trailed away from his fingers like wisps of smoke as Lance cradled his wrist close to his chest, cringing in pain. He thought distantly he heard a voice say his name, but it was drowned out by the loud ringing in his ears.

 

His blood felt like it was on fire, his heart pounded hard against his ribcage, his head felt like it was full of static. With trembling shoulders and shaking knees, Lance shut his eyes to try and mute the amount of input he was receiving, because everything felt like it was just _too much._

 

Through all the noise and fire, Lance registered a gentle weight on his shoulder. A hand?

 

“ _-nce_ … Lance?”

 

The heat began to cool down to a warm buzz, staticy thoughts rushing through Lance’s head at a sluggish pace. The ringing in his ears was replaced by the steady throb of his heartrate and his own shallow breaths. Opening his eyes, Lance squinted at the floor, trying to regain his bearings as his vision tried to focus on his feet. He could feel the red lion’s connection now, however it was weak and closed off like a window locked shut. It was nothing like the welcoming energy that Blue gave off, no, it was angry and hurt. Much like how _Lance_ felt.

 

“Lance, are you alright?”

 

He recognized that voice. It was Keith’s, the _other_ red paladin. The other red paladin, who would now become the black paladin. Who would pilot the black lion from now on, instead of the red. Lance, unbeknownst to himself, felt a foreign and unwelcome spike of anger cut through him, causing his defenses to fire off without warning.

 

On impulse, Lance jerked his shoulder away from Keith’s hand roughly, tightening his already steely grip on his wrist. “I’m _fine, Keith_. Just go bond with your new lion already” he practically hissed.

 

Keith took a step back, hurt painted over his features. Lance vaguely felt the pluck of sadness come from Keith through his bond to the red lion as the red paladin turned away, making his way to the black lion. It was enough to jolt him out of _whatever_ kind of daze his bond to the red lion put him in. He instantly felt regret for lashing out at Keith, but he couldn’t take it back now. He’d just have to apologize later, when he could be away from Red and her unbridled emotions. Then, she couldn’t put words in his mouth again.

 

Red’s jaws slowly opened, and the new red paladin looked up. Red light glowed from inside the passageway ominously, unwelcoming. Lance sure as hell didn’t feel welcome here, but there wasn’t really anything he could do about that. Was there?

 

Red obviously wasn’t enjoying this anymore than he was, and she was making it pretty clear with the way her bond felt so shut off.

 

Lance stepped inside, making his way up to the cockpit. He managed to clear his head a little bit as he sat down, regaining his cool composure. Though, he still felt really uneasy. This just felt so foreign to him, so different. The red lights that flickered to life in the cockpit threw him off, he was used to Blue’s gentle fluorescent light, her encouraging thoughts that nudged at him when he got nervous, the familiar hum that came from the dashboard. It just… seemed to different. Lance didn’t like it, but… well. What can you do?

 

He heard a crackle come on over the intercoms, a private channel had been opened up. It was Hunk, not surprisingly. Lance tapped his helmet to listen to what the yellow paladin had to say.

 

[“How’re you doing, buddy?”]

 

[“Oh, just perfectly fine. Totally not hating this right now, haha”] Lance answered sarcastically, crossing a leg over his knee and crossing his arms over his chest as he glared down at the floor. He heard shuffling come through over the channel, followed by another transmission.

 

[“I’m sure it’ll be okay, don’t worry Lance”] he said sympathetically. Lance couldn’t respond, his mouth twisting into a deep frown. He really wanted to believe his friend, he really did, but… something just felt off. He wasn’t really sure what, if it was the red lion or if it was just the weight of all that’s happened today… Lance didn’t know. He just felt _uncomfortable_. He slumped over a bit in the pilot seat, eyebrows furrowing as he watched Keith approach the black lion from the monitor.

 

The black lion still hasn’t made an effort to move from it’s place, still hunched over in that same position it’s been in for the past couple days. Lance did _not_ like it, but the princess did say that Black was fine. So, Lance supposed, they were probably just resting.

 

Keith was like the size of a tiny bug compared to the black lion as he got close. Lance could feel another stab of foreign anger bounce through him, and this time he was sure that it was the red lion’s anger and not his own. Red must be pretty attached to Keith if she’s this unhappy with him moving to a different lion…

 

Lance watches as Keith places his hand on the lion’s huge muzzle. He felt a flash of jealousy hit him, but this time he wasn’t sure if it was his own or if it was Red’s. Maybe both.

 

For a moment, time seems to be frozen as everyone waited for Keith to make a connection with the black lion. Several ticks pass, nothing happens. A dobash passes, nothing happens. Two dobashes pass, and Lance is starting to really feel like something's not right. Three dobashes pass, and Keith speaks up through the coms finally, uncertainty lacing his voice.

 

[“Uh… Princess, are you sure the black lion is okay?”]

 

[“Yes, I am certain. I would know if something was wrong”]

 

Lance squinted. He was really doubting that statement right now.

 

And as if it were on cue, the black lion suddenly shifted. It pushed itself to its feet, metal creaking and rumbling, forcing Keith to take several steps back. Lance sat up, leaning forward as he watched the scene before him unfold.

 

Instead of leaning down and letting the red paladin inside, the black lion promptly turned around and trudged off, up the huge flight of stairs, and into it’s personal hangar. The personal one that it had been sealed in before Shiro became their pilot. Then, it simply plopped down and curled up like a giant cat, back facing away from the rest of the lions. The purest form of rejection Lance has ever seen in his _life_. He had to force back a laugh when he felt Red practically scoff in the back of his mind.

 

Everyone’s faces appeared on Lance’s monitor, even Coran’s from where he hung back at the Bridge.

 

[“Uh, what the heck just happened?!”] Pidge questioned, hands tightly gripped on her lion’s control levers.

 

[“Did it just reject Keith?!”] Hunk gaped as he leaned in really close to the screen, like he was trying to check if he missed anything.

 

Keith looked up from where he stood, over at the blue lion. He sounded confused and worried when he spoke. [“Allura?”]

 

There were several beats of silence as Lance watched Allura through the screen stare blankly at the black lion. Her eyes seemed unfocused, distant. When she spoke, it seemed more like she was talking to herself than the rest of the team.

 

[“I… I can’t believe it…”]

 

Lance frowned, leaning closer to the monitor. [“What? What’s the matter?”] he questioned, knowing that he should have trusted that bad feeling sooner.

 

There was another beat of silence as everyone waited, eyes on the princess as her expression went from far away to complete and utter _shock_.

 

[“The black lion is… _grieving!_ ”]

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woops there's a cliffhanger :3c


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> more drama, oh boy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHAHAHAH, SORRY NOT SORRY ABOUT THE CLIFFHANGER LAST CHAPTER LMAO. 
> 
> this chapter is gonna be a little shorter than the previous one, mainly because i couldn't think of anything else i wanted to include in it. i apologize if it's a little boring! i can definitely assure you that the upcoming chapters are going to be way more fun. we just gotta get through all this drama biz first 'cause the team has a lot of stuff they need to prepare themselves for.
> 
> also, this chapter is unbeta'd because i wanted to get it out as soon as possible as i am a little behind schedule now. the good news is that i'm on spring break now, so i'll be working on hgapfy twice as much now! woo!
> 
> thank you all so much for reading!!!
> 
> ALSO QUICK NOTE: because i don't think i specified this already, since Allura's life force is connected to the lions, i headcanon that she can communicate with them, similar to the rest of the paladins, but it's more of a "if the lions choose to say anything" to her kind of deal. hope that clears up any confusion!

 

 

_ [“What?!”] _

  
  


Keith’s breath froze in his chest, stomach lurching as if he just took a nose dive in his lion. For a moment he was worried that his knees would give out from underneath him, because suddenly the world was swaying around him as he helplessly watched the black lion curl up within their chamber. His teammates were saying something over the comms, but he couldn’t make out what they were saying. The only thing that Keith could hear was the rush of his pulse beating loudly against his eardrums, and the sudden uproar of thoughts swirling in his head.

 

The black lion is  _ grieving?  _

  
  


_ No, no way. That can’t- that can’t be right. That would imply that Shiro- No. _

 

_ No. _

 

_ Shiro isn’t dead.  _

 

_ Shiro is  _ **_not_ ** _ dead. _

 

Keith sucked in a breath, realizing that he had stopped breathing, and forced himself to find his feet. He was not going to have an anxiety attack now, he had to calm down. He had to calm down so he could figure out what was going on, there has to be more to this.

 

There has to be.

 

Taking many shaky breaths, Keith wiggled his toes and focused on the feeling of them rubbing against the insides of his flight suit. It was a method that Shiro had once taught him to help quell oncoming anxiety attacks. Keith didn’t always remember to use this strategy, because it was hard having to be the one to pull himself out of his own head, but he knew that he could not afford to lose it right now.

 

Once the red paladin felt grounded enough, he concentrated on the voices of his teammates over the comms, feeling nauseous from the stress pressing down on his shoulders. 

 

[“Princess, what do you mean by “grieving”?] Lance was asking, his voice sounding sharp as a knife.

 

[“Is Shiro…?”] Hunk mewled in quiet terror, the tone in his voice mirroring Keith’s own fears. Keith swallowed heavily, his throat felt so dry.

 

[“E-everyone, please calm down. It’s not- it’s not about Shiro. Well- It  _ is _ about Shiro, but not in the way that you think”] the princess’s voice raised above everyone else’s, demanding them be silent. Keith ripped his eyes away from the black lion, turning to stare down the blue one as if his life depended on it.

 

[“Allura, what is going  _ on? _ ”] He managed to get out. The crack in his voice betrayed the sturdy facade he was trying to hold for his own sake.  He sounded helpless, desperate. He hated it.

 

[“The black lion is requesting me to allow it time to grieve. They have been through a lot, like the rest of us. They are not ready to accept a new pilot”] the princess explained. She sounded distant again.

 

[“What about Shiro?”] Pidge piped up. There were a few beats of silence before Allura answered with an uncertain tone in her voice. [“The lion does not know where Shiro is”]

 

What?? How can the lion not know where Shiro is? He’s their pilot! They have a bond! A special connection! They’re able to find each other through that connection, like how Red was able to always find Keith when he was in trouble! How is it that the black lion can’t find him??

 

[“Are they unable to track him down or something?”] asked Lance. 

 

Instead of answering that question, the princess emerged from the blue lion, a determined look on her features. 

 

[“Everyone report back to the Bridge. We have much to discuss”]

  
  


* * *

 

Back at the Bridge, the team had been restless, bombarding the princess with questions about the black lion. About Shiro.

 

Apparently, the black lion is too emotionally compromised to accept a new pilot right now, having been betrayed by their previous pilot, repeatedly being tracked down and forced to submit to him through the use of magic, and then losing that pilot  _ and _ their new one within the same fight. 

 

The lion told Allura that they wish to have time to grieve for a while, and prepare themself for a new pilot. 

 

The lion didn’t know where Shiro was, and could not detect his presence. According to Allura, anyways. Keith couldn’t help but feel doubtful, however. That just didn’t make sense to him. Sure, maybe there was something interfering with Black and Shiro’s connection, maybe Shiro was too far away for Black to reach, but the lack of explanation for why the lion didn’t know where Shiro is… made Keith feel very suspicious.

 

Maybe it was just his paranoia acting up. Maybe Keith was just reaching for possibilities, anything, any possible sign that Shiro was out there somewhere. But could one honestly blame him? Shiro is like family to Keith. He would do anything to find him. He can’t… he can’t lose him again.

 

And when the question was brought up, the “so, what now?” elephant in the room, Keith immediately jumped straight into the discussion after having been keeping quiet for the majority of the time.

 

“We have to find Shiro” Keith insisted. All eyes turned to the red paladin, who wore a determined look on his face. 

 

“We do not have the time for that. The Galra empire is at the most weakest it’s been in thousands of years. We mustn’t waste this opportunity. We will attack the Galra immediately” Allura replied, almost as if she were completely dismissing what Keith said. Irritation flicked like a fire flame in the back of his mind. 

 

“But Shiro could be in danger! We should be searching for him right now!”  

 

“Keith, even if we tried, we have no leads as to where he could possibly be” the princess responded, a wary look on her face. She stood tall, arms crossed behind her back. It was an authoritative posture. 

 

“What about the black lion? They gotta have at least some idea where Shiro is!” the red paladin fired back. 

 

Lance spoke up then, frowning a bit from where he sat, slouched against his chair. “The black lion doesn’t know where Shiro is either though, we’re kinda clueless, man”

 

“What if the black lion is lying to us? They were there when Shiro disappeared, how could they possibly  _ not _ know what happened to him?” Keith questioned, spreading his arms out in a confrontational gesture. He was frowning deeply, desperate to get his teammates to understand the point he was trying to get across.

 

_ “Keith!”  _ Allura snapped, a mixture of shock and offense lacing her tone. Her mouth was parted slightly, brows knitted tightly together.

 

The red paladin winced, a pang of guilt shooting through him, but he continued anyways. “Look, all I’m saying is that we can’t know for sure if the lion is telling the complete truth, okay? There’s gotta be more to it then just “I don’t know”!”

 

Everyone was silent until Hunk spoke up.

 

“Okay, Keith, I agree that we  _ should _ try to look for Shiro, but don’t you think you’re being a little heartless? The poor thing lost  _ two  _ paladins, man…”

 

Keith felt his frustration rising again. Yeah, Keith got that the lion was upset. Sure, lions can get upset, but Shiro could be in danger and the black lion is being incredibly vague. “I don’t know” didn’t cut it for the red paladin. 

 

Did the black lion even care that Shiro was missing? That he could still be alive somewhere? In need of help? Why was the lion just going to sit there and do nothing while every tick wasted could mean Shiro’s death?

 

Glaring down at the floor, Keith’s impulse got the better of him as he spoke again. “If the black lion cared about Shiro then they wouldn’t just sit around doing nothing! They would at least give us a better answer than just “I don’t know”!” the red paladin growled, fists balling at his sides. He felt so helpless. Were they even listening to him?

 

“How could you say that?!” Allura gasped, eyes widening. Hunk, taking a step forward, put himself between the princess and Keith, a stern look on his face. “Dude”

 

“We can’t just waste time attacking the Galra when Shiro is missing, okay?  He could be in danger! He could be hurt!” Keith was desperate at this point. He so badly wanted his teammates to understand, to listen. Why wouldn’t they listen? Didn’t they think Shiro should be their first priority??

 

Hunk looked like he was about to say something, but was cut off by Pidge’s shout, cutting through the air like a knife.

 

“Wasting time?!  _ Are you fucking kidding me?! _ ”

 

All eyes shot over to the green paladin, who stood with her hands balled tightly at her sides, a furious gleam in her eyes that bore down on Keith with a dangerous intensity.

 

“Literally fuck you, Keith! How do you think I feel about  _ my _ family?! They have been missing for an entire  _ year _ ! I don’t even know if they are still alive, and you have the nerve to say shit like that?! News flash, Keith, but you’re not the only one missing family here! Stop making all of this about yourself, you damn hypocrite!” she snarled.

 

Keith was speechless, finding himself unable to respond. His neck began to heat up in embarrassment as the realization dawned on him. He hadn’t considered that Pidge is missing family too…

 

“Ok, ok ok ok enough guys. It’s bad enough we had one fight today, we don’t need another one” Lance sat up in his seat and held up his hands in a “calm down” gesture, though, Pidge didn’t seem to hear him as she continued.

 

“Keith, you're always willing to leave others behind and just attack the Galra, but the moment Shiro goes missing you just have to drop everything and look for him instead of considering how the rest of us feel about this!” She ranted, voice pitched higher than normal in her anger. She took a shaky breath to calm herself, head dropping as her bottom lip quivered. “That’s just…. just not fair!” 

 

Keith couldn’t bring himself to look at his teammates, staring off to the side at the floor. 

 

“She kinda has a point...” Hunk added, crossing his arms. The red paladin wanted to say something, anything, but he was at a loss for words. He couldn’t seem to form a proper sentence in his head as his embarrassment curled in his stomach.

 

“Guys! Seriously! Can we just chill for like, five minutes??” Lance said, louder this time. He wasn’t sitting in his chair anymore, instead he had gotten up to approach the group. Coran came to stand at his side, nodding in agreement. “Lance is right. Let’s all relax for a moment. We’re all stressed but we won’t get anywhere bickering like this!”

 

“Yeah, everyone just calm down for a tick” the blue paladin nodded at Coran before looking around at the group. Keith frowned uncomfortably in his guilt as he crossed his arms, looking up at Lance and Coran.

 

Everyone was silent for several ticks, the tension in the air hot and uncomfortable. Lance looked between the princess and Keith, eyes hardened and stern.

 

“I’m gonna be real honest right now. Both of you are being pretty inconsiderate” The blue paladin stated, crossing his arms and perking an eyebrow. He looked to Allura, who had her eyes glued to the floor. Her pointed ears almost seemed flattened, reminding Keith of something a cat would do.

 

“Allura, even if we don't have any possible leads on Shiro's location right now, we should still look for him. We don't know that he's dead, we only know he's missing! When you got captured by the Galra, Shiro dropped  _ everything _ to go get you, even if the risks were really bad. For all we know, Shiro could be in the same situation you were in, so please stop acting like there's no hope left”

 

Lance sounded like he was practically scolding the princess, who was shooting a pout back at him. Keith wanted to let his smugness show in the form of a smirk, but then Lance zeroed in on the red paladin with a hawk like stare.

 

“And Keith, Allura and Pidge have a point. You need to remember that we are in the middle of a  _ war _ right now. It would be in our best interest if we hit the Galra while they’re still down. We can't just put all our focus on looking for one person when we have no way of knowing where he is”.

 

Keith opened his mouth, about to respond and bring up the black lion again, but Lance seemed to read his mind and cut him off with a raised finger, continuing his lecture.

 

“And! I know that our best bet is the black lion, but until they are ready to accept a new pilot, we can't do anything about it, okay? It sucks but that’s just how emotions are. Even giant robot space lions have feelings too, dude” Lance crossed his arms again, fixing Keith with a Look. The kind of look that reminded him of the ones Shiro would give when scolding him. 

 

Keith felt himself shrink a little under the blue paladin’s stare, eyes falling to his feet again. 

 

Lance closed his eyes and sighed before looking back up at everyone. His eyes seemed to droop sadly, tired.

 

“Guys, obviously we're in a bad spot right now... but we seriously shouldn't let fights like this happen. I know this morning was bad and all but it’s really not what Shiro would want... right?”

 

The group exchanged looks with each other, mumbling agreements amongst one another. Lance clapped his hands together, smile returning to his features for once in a long time. “Okay, then let’s work together to figure this out, yeah?”

 

“What do you think we should do, Lance?” Hunk spoke up, turning to his friend expectantly. Keith looked back up too, briefly looking at Pidge. She still looked pissed off…

 

Lance blinked, looking surprised by the sudden attention being directed towards him. “Oh- well… uh… the ship is pretty messed up right now...?”

 

“Yeah, the castle sustained a lot of structural damage during our last battle. We should contact the Olkari and work on repairing and upgrading the ship first” Pidge agreed. Lance glanced at the green paladin, nodding. “What she said”.

  
  


“My humble apologies if I am interrupting, but I must return to the Blade of Marmora as soon as possible. I need to inform them of Antok's death, as well as work toward our own next plan of action” Kolivan suddenly spoke up. He had been quietly standing at the edge of the group, allowing the team to discuss their plans.

 

“Yes, of course, Kolivan. We will escort you back to your base as soon as we can” Allura responded, turning to face the Blade of Marmora soldier calmly. He dipped his head respectfully. “Thank you, Princess Allura”.

 

The princess nodded stiffly to Kolivan.

 

“So, repairs first. Then what?” Lance asked, shifting his weight to lean on one leg while he rested a hand on his hip. He seemed more visibly relaxed.

 

“We attack Zarkon’s empire immediately” Allura responded, clasping her hands behind her back.

 

“What about  _ Shiro _ ?” Keith growled impatiently, still wanting an answer. While it was nice and everything that they were finally sorting things out, he still wanted to look for his missing teammate. He still wanted the rest of his teammates to listen…

 

Allura looked like she was about to say something, however she was interrupted by the sound of a door opening behind them.

 

“Perhaps I can be of assistance!” came Slav’s voice. Everyone turned around, watching the multi-limbed alien come scurrying in. Keith immediately felt his impatience from earlier return just upon seeing the quantum mechanic, and stiffened his shoulders in response to that impatience.

 

“Oh boy…” Hunk muttered quietly.

 

“Ah… ‘sup Slav” Lance said, pulling half his mouth back in a tight half smile.

 

“How are you supposed to help?” Keith asked, raising a suspicious eyebrow. He did not have the patience for this guy, nor did he expect him to be able to contribute to the search for Shiro.

 

Slav seemed to take offense to that question, because suddenly he was up in Keith’s face, half of his arms on his hips while the others were crossed while he glared comically at the red paladin.

 

“How am I supposed to help? Hah!! Who do you take me for? I'm a quantum mechanicist! An expert on the functions of alternate realities! Space time anomalies like this happen all the time! I can look into your friend's disappearance for you while the rest of you are off attacking the Galra!”

 

Keith leaned away from Slav, squinting suspiciously still. “But how do we know that you can  _ find  _ him?”

 

The red paladin felt a hand clamp down on his shoulder. Looking up, he was met with Kolivan’s unreadable face. “Slav is a genius ahead of our time, it would be wise to trust his judgement” he stated cooly. 

“Are you sure that you’ll be able to do it all on your own, though?” Hunk’s question was directed at Slav as he came to stand by Keith.

 

The quantum mechanic turned away, stroking his chin thoughtfully. “Hmmm… I may need someone to help me gather information on the disappearance…” 

 

“I’ll do it” Keith immediately responded. If there was anything he could do to help get Shiro back, anything at all… he would do it.

 

Slav looked back to the red paladin, squinting critically at him.

 

“Alright! We got that part figured out, how about our next plan of attack on the Galra? We just gonna attack the nearest base or something? Go all hail mary on them?” asked Lance. 

 

“We don’t know what the current state of the empire is. We don’t even know if Zarkon is still alive or not” Pidge pointed out, hand turned upwards gesturing at nothing in particular. 

 

“We’ll need to find out” Allura responded as she approached her post at the ship’s controls, pulling up a map of Zarkon’s empire. “Kolivan, we’re going to need you to contact the spies you have within the empire’s ranks as soon as possible so we can get an inkling as to what’s going on inside. We don’t know just how vulnerable they are right now, and we must be able to make a judgement on which parts of the empire will be ideal for us to attack now that their central command is down”

 

The Blade of Marmora soldier nodded. “Of course. As soon as you can return me to the Blade of Marmora, I will be able to find out”.

 

A small smile crept up onto the princess’ face. “Good” she replied, nodding her head once.

 

“We should make that our first priority! Then once we have a visual on the empire, we can contact the Olkari for negotiations on castle repairs!” Coran piped up. He had moved to the ship’s dashboard and was now looking over the sections of the castle that needed the most drastic repairs first.

 

Lance grinned, punching his fist to the palm of his hand enthusiastically. “Yeah! Then we can decide on where we’ll hit the Galra first!” 

 

“But what about the lions? How long is it going to take for the black lion to be ready to accept a temporary pilot?” Hunk asked, turning to the princess expectantly. Keith looked up at her too, frowning.

 

She watched the Galra empire map thoughtfully, eyebrows creased in concentration. “I’m...not sure. The lion has endured a lot, it may be a while…”

 

Lance rested his hands on his hips, tilting his head to the side. “Sooooo… am I just going to stay in the blue lion until the black one is ready for Keith?”

 

Allura looked up from the map, clasping her hands behind her back. “Most likely, however I would highly recommend that you try to bond with the red one as much as you can,” Her face softened into that of a sympathetic one as she continued. “I know it’s a very radical adjustment for Voltron, and we cannot afford to have any forced bonds. We have to be ready to form voltron as soon as possible. I will need to do the same with the blue lion as well”

 

Keith glanced over at the new red paladin cautiously, remembering how that topic was handled earlier that day. Lance seemed to droop a bit, eyes lowering to the ground as he stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. “Alright…” he muttered. Keith felt a pang of concern for his teammate.

 

Suddenly, Coran was there, patting Lance on the back. The blue paladin looked up at the older altean in surprise. 

 

“I would suggest that Keith aid you in adjusting to the red lion! Team bonding will help get you familiarized with the red lion and the red lion familiarized with you! It’s very finicky with trust and multiple paladin bonds, but it’s pretty clear that Keith a strong bond to her so i’m sure that you should be able to make a smooth transition with his help!” Coran hummed encouragingly, directing Lance’s attention towards Keith.

 

Keith blinked, instantly feeling his stomach flood with butterflies. Help Lance transition to the red lion? Through team bonding? As in deliberately spending time with Lance?

 

It sounded like a blessing and a curse, and Keith wasn’t quite sure which.

 

When Lance looked over at Keith, the older red paladin felt his cheeks heat up a little. 

 

“Uhm, okay. I.. I can do that” Keith stuttered slightly, clearing his throat which was feeling rather dry.

 

He could do that, yes. 

 

But he wasn’t sure if he could handle it.

 

 

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> time to take a break from the angst and drama! we need some team bonding guys

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ayyy time for another chapter. this may seem like plot filler, but you'd be surprised :)
> 
> anyways, thanks again so so so much for reading!! all of your guys' comments has really helped motivate me to keep pushing through!!! i'm having so much fun writing this story :'D
> 
> be sure to check me out on tumblr for updates and any questions you might have @sniperlance.tumblr.com !
> 
> aaand thanks again to my lovely betas for proof reading!
> 
> enjoy the chapter!

 

 

That night, Princess Allura could not sleep.

 

After vargas of tossing and turning within her bed, she found that rest would not come to her no matter how much she tried to relax her mind. Thoughts of that day, the past couple of days, and everything else that has happened since she awoke from her sleeping chamber that fateful day buzzed around in her head restlessly, and eventually she just could not lay there any longer.

 

The princess found herself walking the halls of the castle, her mice friends riding on her shoulders as she tried to clear her mind, however it proved to be difficult. Grief, anger, sadness, worry, homesickness, and emotional exhaustion cycled through her heart as she made her rounds throughout the castle, but her mind always drifted back to the black lion.

 

It worried her immensely that Black was not ready to take up a new paladin, because then they would not be able to form Voltron. And to Allura, that meant vulnerability. She always depended on Voltron to feel secure when caught in the middle of this war. It was her security blanket. Her father built it to make her, and the rest of her people to feel safe in a universe so vast and full of shadowy corners. And now, the very thing that could allow her to rest easy was unable to do just that.

 

Allura understood that the black lion has endured so much. She had a front row seat when their first paladin turned on them and tried to weaponize them thousands of years ago. That alone was a very painful event to experience, and the princess felt terrible for what Zarkon did to Black. 

 

With the loss of a second paladin, Allura couldn’t imagine what the black lion must be going through right now. She seriously hoped that they would soon be ready for a new pilot, but she understood if they needed time to heal and accept the loss of another pilot.

 

The princess sighed heavily, tired eyes lowering to watch her feet as they carried her down a dark hallway almost mechanically. The mice that sat upon her shoulders watched Allura’s face sadly, wishing there was something more they could do to make the princess fell better. 

 

She wasn’t surprised when she caught herself at the door to the Bridge. On nights like these, when she could not sleep, she always found herself drawn to the main control room so she could look over the map of the present day universe, counting the number of distress signals coming from all corners of Zarkon’s empire.

 

However, the princess was surprised when the doors opened to reveal the hunched over forms of Lance and Hunk sitting at the front of the room, a blanket wrapped around their shoulders as they spoke quietly to one another. Her first instinct was to press herself against the wall and listen to what they were saying, however the sound of the doors opening gave her position away too quickly and the two paladins were already glancing over their shoulders at her.

 

“Oh- uhm- er- Good evening, gentlemen” Allura stuttered awkwardly, shoulders stiffening as she clasped her hands behind her back, posture straightening automatically. She mentally cursed herself for letting herself get caught by one of the other paladins  _ again _ in the middle of the night (technically two this time). It was incredibly awkward for her to run into one of the others when she was feeling restless.

 

Lance, typical and snarky Lance, raised a fingergun at the princess and smirked with a wink, though she did not miss the sniffle that caught in his nose as he spoke. “Ayyye Allura, did’ya come to check out your fellow brave paladins?”

 

Allura huffed, arms crossing over her chest. “The only ones “checking out” should be you two paladins! Why are you not resting? Have you any idea what time it is?” she shot back cooley, eyebrows knitting together.

 

Lance’s smirk dropped, replaced with an eyeroll that rolled his entire head until it rested against Hunk’s shoulder. “Uuuuugghh, you sound like my mamá when you say that” he whined. Hunk smiled apologetically at the princess as he pat Lance on the shoulder. “Sorry Princess, we…” he paused, glancing down at his friend. “...Couldn’t sleep”.

 

Allura frowned, concern for her teammates blooming in her chest as she uncrossed her arms. “Is something the matter?” She asked gently as she approached the other two paladins, a stark contrast to her scolding words moments before.

 

Lance looked up at the princess as she came to sit down by them, and then glanced at the floor. “Uh, just missin’ home…” he mumbled. Now that Allura was close enough, she could see the puffiness around his eyes. It was clear he must of been crying earlier.

 

“I understand…” Allura sighed, folding her hands in her lap. She was wearing one of her sleeping gowns, though she didn’t bother to grab a pair of shoes when she left her room. She personally enjoyed the feeling of walking around barefoot. Lance and Hunk were dressed in their paladin pajamas, slippers and everything.

 

Lance shrugged a bit, letting out a small breathy laugh. “Heh, yeah… I don’t know. Feelings are dumb. I’m feeling more homesick than usual tonight, no idea why” the older blue paladin’s voice was almost a whisper. Allura smiled sympathetically, leaning towards the two paladins a little. “That’s probably my fault, my apologies, Lance” she whispered back.

 

Hunk looked up at the princess, raising a curious eyebrow. “What do you mean, Allura?” he asked as quietly as the other two. Lance looked confused too, tilting his head expectantly for further explanation.

 

“Well, sometimes when two paladins share a bond to a lion, depending on how strong their bond is to the lion, they can pick up on what the other paladin is feeling. It can overlap and occasionally enhance the other’s emotions, if the two are feeling something something similar to one another” The princess explained carefully. Her teammates’ eyes widened in amazement upon hearing the new information.

 

“Ooooooooohhhh, so THAT’S what that was earlier today. Huh, wild” Lance brought a hand to his chin thoughtfully, looking up at the ceiling in wonder. Hunk nodded, fists balling up excitedly by his chest. “Wow, that’s so cool!”

 

Allura nodded, looking up at the great windows that surrounded the Bridge, watching the stars that drifted by the ship as it made it’s way across the universe. “It is quite interesting indeed…” she sighed.

 

Lance looked back over at the princess, chin still cupped in his hand. He raised a cautious eyebrow at her, frowning slightly. “...Are you okay, Allura?” he asked carefully.

 

The princess’s eyes shot back down to the older blue paladin quickly, and then darted away, clearing her throat. “I’m quite alright, do not worry about me” She insisted.

 

Hunk raised a skeptical eyebrow, mirroring Lance’s own. “You sure? You’re kinda, awake. In the middle of the night. Like us?” the yellow paladin questioned.

 

Lance crossed his arms, squinting his eyes suspiciously. “Yeeeeaaaah, you sure you’re” -Lance swapped into a very poor Altean accent- “”quite alright”, Princess?”

 

Allura pouted a bit at the other two. “I- well, I’m....” trailing off, the princess sighed and looked down at her feet, unable to form a good excuse. The mice that sat on her shoulders cuddled close to her neck in an effort to comfort their larger Altean friend.

 

“Hey man, you can totally talk to us if you need to. We’re here for you, Allura” said Hunk, who was leaning towards Allura a little bit, compassion lacing his features. 

 

The princess looked up, smiling thankfully. “I suppose you are right. I have had a lot on my mind lately…” 

 

“Haven’t we all” Lance huffed with light sarcasm, which, earned a sharp nudge from Hunk. Lance grunted and looked up at his friend with indiginance written all over his face, and the yellow paladin only responded with a frown and a head tilt towards the princess. Allura couldn’t help but smirk in amusement.

 

“You wanna talk about it? I mean, we’re like, paladin teammates now. We’re gonna have to bond more so we can form Voltron and all that snazz n jazz” Lance shot Hunk a look before looking back to Allura. 

 

Allura looked down, furrowing her eyebrows thoughtfully. “Well, I suppose I’m just worried. About a lot of things. Worried about the typical things a princess who is leading a rebellion against an evil intergalactic dictator and his empire…”

 

Hunk smiled sympathetically, leaning forward to pat Allura on the shoulder in a comforting gesture. “I get you” he agreed.

 

The princess looked up at Hunk studying him carefully. Then she looked to Lance, debating on wether or not she wanted to share what was on her mind. She didn’t want her teammates to worry about her, though she supposed it wasn’t something she would be able to hide any longer, now that she and Lance had a shared connection to the blue lion. Not only that, but she would have no choice but to open up to the rest of them, if they are to form Voltron successfully.

 

Looking forward, up at the great windows that surrounded the Bridge, Allura sighed. “...I miss Altea dearly. Every day i think about home, how much i wished it were still existed. I…” Allura trailed off with a faint grimace on her face, lowering her gaze down to her feet. The mice that sat on her shoulders lowered their ears sadly. They too missed the home they would never see again.

 

“I worry that I may not be able to be as strong a leader as I’ve been trying to be, now that Shiro is gone. I relied on his determination and will to fight when I found my own strength wavering. But now the Galra have taken that from me even…” The princess spoke softly, iridescent eyes trailing over the intricate patterns on her sleeping gown. She felt a foreign emotion tug at her heart, and in an instant she knew it must be the overlap of Lance’s own emotions. It felt like concern...pain…. Understanding…

 

It was a strong reminder to Allura that everyone was hurting from Shiro’s disappearance, even Lance, who always seemed to be so unaffected by it.

 

The princess absently fiddled with her gown as she continued her rant. “I’m...sure that Keith may prove to be an ideal pilot for the black lion, I don’t doubt his abilities….but…” she trailed off with a frown.

 

“Is it the whole “part Galra” thing?” Hunk asked guardedly, voice lowered and serious. Allura’s frown deepened, and she looked off to the side, avoiding eye contact.

 

Lance quirked an eyebrow, and the princess felt a pang of defensiveness come off of Lance. “Princess, just because he’s part Galra, doesn’t make him bad” the older blue paladin stated firmly.

 

Allura quickly straightened up, eyes darting back over to her fellow teammates. “I know! I know, it’s not-” she waved her hands dismissively, brushing away the very thought.

 

“I know that he is not to be blamed for the mistakes that those who share his blood have made, and I genuinely  _ do not  _ blame him. I… wanted to, but I realized how ridiculous that would be. It’s just...it’s not easy to adjust to. The Galra...broke my trust in their race long ago and… I’m trying my best to rebuild that trust” the princess explained quickly, hoping that her teammates would understand. 

 

It wasn’t that she hated Keith. She did not  _ hate _ him in the slightest, he, and the rest of the team, were like family to Allura now. However, there was once someone who was Galra that Allura considered like family before Keith, and he betrayed her and her father, started a war, and wiped out her entire race as if it meant nothing to him.

 

Building back up the trust that had been shattered by Zarkon and his followers would not be easy for Princess Allura. But she would try, nonetheless.

 

“Yeeeaah, I understand” Lance sighed, leaning forward a bit. “You just gotta remember he’s not bad or anything, he’s just a big grump who pouts all the time, like-” he paused, crossing his arms over his chest and pouted mockingly. “Ugh”.

 

Allura couldn’t hold back her little chuckle at the Keith impersonation Lance was making. He was right… Keith isn’t really...bad at all. He isn’t.

 

Lance rolled his eyes then, his mock pout turning into a serious one. “He’s also a bit of a show off” he grunted in vague annoyance.

 

“Aww, c’mon Lance, don’t be like that” Hunk sighed, shoulders slumping deeply as he leaned back against the stairs. Lance glanced over his shoulder at the yellow paladin, squinting indignantly. “Am I lying, though?”

 

Hunk held up a hand to emphasize his point. “Dude, no offence, but you’re a show off too” he stated a matter of factly. Lance gaped at his friend, eyes widening as he spread his arms out. “Uhm, full offence taken!” he yelped. Hunk shrugged, shooting the princess an ‘amiright?’ look. Allura smirked back, eyes then flicking back to the older blue paladin.

 

Lance looked between the two, then scoffed, crossing his arms tightly over his chest in an overdramatic display. “Ugh! I can’t believe you, Hunk. Turning on your best friend like this. What a shameful thing to do!” 

 

Hunk sat up, rolling his eyes. “Don’t be so dramatic, man” he grumbled, though his tone had an amused lift to it. Lance then promptly flopped over into Hunk’s lap, the back of his hand resting against his forehead as he closed his eyes. “I can’t not be dramatic! Not when my best friend decides to side with my best rival!” he whined pitifully.

 

“Best rival??” Hunk’s eyes widened at his friend, an eyebrow shooting upwards skeptically. Lance’s eyes snapped open, and he removed his hand from his forehead slowly as he looked up at the yellow paladin hesitantly. “I-wh- y-yeah! You heard me! Did I stutter??”

 

Allura noticed the blush that was blooming faintly on the older blue paladin’s face.

 

“You literally just stuttered a second ago” Hunk deadpanned.

 

“That’s besides the point!”

 

“Oh my god Lance, get off. You’re gonna make my legs fall asleep”

 

Lance crossed his arms, wiggling himself a little bit more comfortably into Hunk’s lap. “Nope! This is what you get for betraying me”

 

Allura was giggling now, trying to stifle her laugh with a hand over her mouth. The space mice were chittering in amusement at the paladin’s playful display. It was good to see such friendly behavior after the stressful day everyone had, especially from Lance. There was something about the blue paladin’s sense of humor that, Allura felt, seemed to relax everyone when tensions were high. Coran had a similar air to the older blue paladin. Though, the princess knew that Coran was struggling as much as the rest of them were to stay strong in these trying times.

 

“By the way, Princess” Lance’s voice pulled Allura out of her thoughts, and she looked back to him suspiciously, half expecting him to try another pick-up line on her.

 

However, she was surprised to see that Lance had rolled over so he was laying on his stomach (still laying in Hunk’s lap), and had a serious expression on his face. When he spoke, he spoke genuinely. 

 

“To be completely honest, I really look up to you. You’re a really strong person, and seriously, I don’t know what I would do if I lost my home planet. So… I think you’ll be okay”.

 

Nothing but sincerity came from Lance’s side of the bond overlap, telling the princess that he was being serious. 

 

Princess Allura… hadn’t realized that the words “you will be okay” were something she seriously needed to hear. Because… for the past few days, she truly did not know if she would be.

 

“...Thank you, Lance” Allura responded sincerely. Lance shot a fingergun back at her, though he had a friendly smile on his face.

 

“Okay, but seriously Lance. If you don’t move, I will push you off” Hunk interjected, crossing his arms sternly. Lance’s smile fell away into a pout, and he looked back up at his friend. “You wouldn’t do that to your best friend??” he gaped, placing a hand over his heart dramatically. 

 

There were approximately seven beats of silence where Hunk and Lance were locked into one of the most intense staredowns Allura has ever seen. It left her on edge, wanting to know what would happen next. She leaned forward in anticipation, waiting.

  
  
  
  


_ Thunk.  _

  
  
  


Off Lance was pushed, and he landed on the blanket that the two paladins had ditched a while ago, which was now resting on the floor. The older blue paladin let out an “oof!” as he landed, and suddenly Allura was laughing hysterically along with Hunk. She clutched at her stomach, doubling over as uncontrollable giggles bubbled out of her chest. She could feel tears beginning to prick at the corners of her eyes she was laughing so hard. Hunk’s laughter died down sooner than Allura’s, though by then she was just giggling and trying to stifle her giggles with her hands.

 

Lance was unmoving from where he lay face down on the floor. “Oh no, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” he mumbled through the blanket, voice muffled.

 

Hunk snorted. “Did you seriously just reference that meme?”

 

Lance lifted a hand, pointing in Hunk’s general direction (though it was a little off to the side). “Yes Hunk, yes I did”.

 

Allura let out another giggle, removing her hand from her mouth and tilting her head curiously. “What is a ‘meme’?” she asked.

 

There was a pause, and then Lance lifted his head and looked up at the princess in pure shock, jaw dropped and eyes wide, hand slapping down on the ground. “You don’t know what a meme is??” He gasped sharply.

 

Allura jumped lightly at the sudden reaction.

 

“Well, to be fair, she is kinda an alien” Hunk pointed out. Lance scrambled into a sitting position, gesturing wildly with his hands. “Hunk, we need to fix this. Me, you, and Pidge gotta give Allura some meme lessons! We need to school her on the culture of memes! This is essential if she is going to be flying a lion with us!” the older blue paladin exclaimed.

 

“Heh, while we’re at it, we should try to get Keith to participate again” Hunk agreed, leaning back against the stairs on his arms. Lance shot a fingergun at the yellow paladin, grinning. “Yes, we gotta do that too. We can’t have two teammates who don’t understand Earth references!’

 

The princess chuckled in amusement as she pet the space mice sitting on her shoulders. “I doubt I will be getting out of this, will I?” 

 

“Nope! We gotta start right away! Hunk, what do you think we should start on first?” Lance was practically gleaming with excitement as he scooted closer to the other two, pulling the blanket up over his shoulders like a cape. 

 

Hunk held his chin thoughtfully, looking up at the ceiling as he considered. “Weeell, we should probably explain what a meme is first”.

 

“Yeah, true” Lance nodded, looking back over to Allura.

 

The next few hours Allura stayed at the Bridge were spent learning about the complexity of memes and the history they have played in human culture, and she realized that humans were far more confusing than she initially thought. Though, she couldn’t help but feel at ease in the presence of her teammates. For once she felt like she could allow herself to be vulnerable, and just sit back and relax for a while. It was a relieving change of pace for a princess who had been forced to grow up really fast.

 

 

* * *

 

 

The sound of rapid knocking on his door woke him.

 

Lance grunted, rolling over in his bed and willing himself to go back to sleep. Who the hell could be knocking on his door at this time in the morning? It had to at least be 5am castle time, or at least that’s what it felt like. The team had at least two more hours before they usually got up for breakfast and training! Whoever was knocking on his door would just have to wait because Lance desperately needed to catch up on his beauty sleep. He had only just started recovering from the restless past few days he and the team have endured and he was not about to let the purple bruised bags under his eyes make a permanent home on his face.

 

Sighing contentedly, Lance could feel himself beginning to drift back off into the warm blanket of unconsciousness as he snuggled deeper into his bed.

 

_ Knock knock knock knock. _

 

Oh for the love of-

 

“I am trying to sleep! Thank you! Go away please!” Lance shouted a little louder than he intended to, grumpiness from the rude disturbance giving a slight edge in his tone. Despite the sleep mask he was wearing, his eyebrows were knitted together in irritation as he glared in the general direction of which is bedroom door was. Nobody answered back, and Lance was beginning to suspect someone was trying to play a prank on him. Well, jokes on that person, because Lance could easily block out the noise with the headphones Pidge gave him. 

 

Lance threw an arm out and sluggishly felt around for the headset that he usually kept sitting there by the base of his bed. When he felt his fingers brush over the headphones, he smirked a little bit and grabbed them, pulling them on and relishing in the noise canceling bliss that they provided. 

 

The paladin sunk back into his bed, annoyed that he was slightly more awake now. He probably wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep at this point, but the least he could do was spite the person and ignore their attempts to get him out of bed. That’ll show ‘em.

 

Just when his mind was beginning to drift off as he entertained the thought of making more face mask applicant later on today, the feeling of a firm hand clamping down on his shoulder and shaking him yanked him out of his mind and he let out a startled screech.

 

Flinching away from the contact, Lance scrambled back up against the bedroom wall that connected to his bed, headphones falling from his head and hanging around his neck in the process, and he tugged his sleep mask up quickly to see who the intruder was. 

 

He was at least expecting it to be Hunk, or maybe even Pidge asking for her headphones back, but it was neither of the two.

 

Nope. It was Keith, who was standing by the bed, dressed in casual clothes and ready for the day, with that same ‘ol pout on his face. Lance blinked slowly, mouth agape, needing a moment to process the fact that _ Keith  _ was in his room, before his eyes screwed up in an annoyed squint. “What the quiznack are you doing in my room?? Don’t you know what privacy is?!” he snapped.

 

Keith rolled his eyes, arms coming up to cross over his chest. “I knocked on your door like, five times. You didn’t answer”.

 

“Uhm, yeah! Because I’m trying to sleep! Duh!” Lance’s arms flew out to his sides and he stuck his chin out to emphasize that this was the most obvious thing in the universe. Keith continued to just glare at him, frowning blankly and not seeming to get Lance’s annoyance. 

 

The blue paladin sighed, one arm dropping to his side while the other rubbed his eyes tiredly. “Do you have any idea what time it is? Nobody has to get up for at least another three hours” Lance grumbled, pulling the headphones off his neck.

 

Keith shrugged, not seeming to care. “So?”

 

Lance let out a long annoyed groan and proceeded to flop over in his bed. “So? It’s sleep time right now, not, “hey let’s go bother Lance” time! What do you even want??”

 

Keith’s eyes flicked away for a brief second, almost seeming to hesitate. “We have things we gotta do” he said.

 

Lance quirked an eyebrow in questioning. “Liiiike…?”

 

“Well- Coran said that we needed to bond more so that you can pilot the red lion easier, so, we’re gonna do that. Right now” the red paladin explained, a hint of awkwardness tracing his speech.

 

Lance snorted, crossing his arms behind his head. “What’d you have in mind? Napping together? Pillow fight? Team gossiping?” he snarked, sarcasm dripping from his voice. Keith blinked, eyebrows raising to the point they disappeared under his bangs. “What? No- I was- gonna teach you how to fly Red” the other boy stuttered, faint pink beginning to bloom across his cheeks.

 

Lance’s smirk dropped, melting into a frown. He rolled over on his side, facing away from Keith. “No thanks. Try something else” he deadpanned.

 

“Hey no, we’re doing this. Come on” Keith growled, planting a hand on Lance’s shoulder and tugging at him. Lance whined, not budging. “Noooo, I don’t feel like iiiiit”.

 

“Lance, come  _ on _ ” 

 

“I don’t wanna!”

 

“Lance!”

 

“No! Nooope nopity nope nope!”

 

“I will make you if I have to!”

 

The blue paladin shot a glare over his shoulder at Keith, azure eyes like icy lasers. “Go ahead and try, I dare you” he challenged.

 

Keith met Lance’s glare with his own fiery stare, and several beats of silent tension passed between them.

 

 

...

 

 

“KEITH PUT ME DOWN”

  
  


The hiss of the automatic bedroom door opening rang out through the hallway as the red paladin stepped out, Lance slung over his shoulder in a fireman carrying hold. Lance struggled in the other boy’s grip, thrashing wildly and desperately trying to hold onto the bedroom door.

 

Keith grit his teeth and tugged away from the door, forcing Lance to let go. The blue paladin whined loudly, reaching out for his bedroom as it got further and further away. “Help! I’m getting Keith-napped!” he yelled down the hall, even though he knew nobody would hear him. This was his and Keith’s hallway. Pidge and Hunk’s hallway was way on the other side of the castle, while Shiro’s was located somewhere in the middle of the ship, and Allura’s was at the very top floor.

 

Maybe Coran was up already and was tending to castle duties, or the space mice could come to his rescue...

 

“Don’t you mean “Lance-napped”? Keith-napped implies I’m the one getting kidnapped” Keith pointed out nonchalantly as he hauled Lance down the corridor. The blue paladin wriggled violently in the other boy’s grip in irritation. “Whatever! I’m still getting taken against my will” he snapped. Keith snickered in amusement.

 

Eventually, Lance gave up trying to get free of Keith’s steely grip, instead going limp as he slumped over across the red paladin’s shoulders. Keith carried him in silence for several dobashes, and the quiet was beginning to weigh down on Lance. 

 

He propped his chin up on his elbow, which rested on Keith’s shoulder, and blew a long raspberry sigh. Keith glanced up at him from the corner of his eye, that infuriatingly adorable smirk still pulling at the corners of mouth. The blue paladin squinted back with an annoyed pout. 

 

“Are you seriously going to carry me all the way to the hangers?” Lance grumbled, eyes flicking back up to watch the hallway walls pass by them. He felt Keith huff underneath him.

 

“Well, if I put you down, you’re just gonna run back to your room, so yeah probably”.

 

“Uughgggghhhh…..” Lance groaned loud in annoyance, slumping over again. 

  
  


By the time they made it to the red lion’s hanger, Lance had lowkey begun to panic. Not because he didn’t want to pilot Red, no- it was because Keith had been carrying him on his shoulders the whole way and has not broken a sweat yet, he hardly even seemed tired. Keith must be stronger than he looks, and that was nnnnnot doing fun things to Lance’s tummy. Not at all.

 

Keith helped Lance down, hands coming to hold onto Lance’s biceps to keep him steady on his feet. Lance’s throat was only a little dry. Only a little. 

 

“Well… let’s go” said the older red paladin, releasing his grip on Lance’s arms and turning away, heading off towards the red lion. Lance’s mind blanked out for a moment, a little bit too caught up in the way his stomach flipped over as a swath of butterflies tickled at his insides.  _ No no no, stop thinking about Keith like that, just, stop. We aren’t doing this. _

 

Keith stopped and turned around once he got near Red, placing his hands on his hips. “Are you coming?”

 

“Er- yeah- yeah” Lance stuttered, shaking his head a little to clear away the fleeting feelings that threatened to cloud his mind. He followed after his teammate, trying to will away the blush he knew was starting to dust his cheeks. 

 

Once they got inside the red lion, Keith instructed Lance to sit down in the pilot seat. Lance huffed out another sigh, knowing at this point there really was no getting out of this. He flopped down into the cushioned seat, pouting like a toddler. 

 

He could feel Red’s connection beginning to resurface in the back of his mind, though there was something off about it. It felt incredibly closed off, far more so than the last time he stepped foot inside this lion. It felt like something small and out of reach, something that neither Lance or the lion truly wanted to pursue. It made a wave of uneasiness roll over his mind.

 

Red’s dashboard came to life after a moment, the bright red lights flickering on and casting a harsh red glow over Lance and Keith’s faces. 

 

“Okay, so you’re going to want to grab hold of the levers and gently ease out of the hanger-” Keith started, but was immediately cut off with a scoff from Lance. “Psh! I know how to fly a lion Keith, I got this” he snapped, waving a hand dismissively. 

 

He doesn’t got this.

 

As soon as he set his hands down on the control levers and pushed forward, the red lion shot out of the hanger and all but speed bulleted out into space, away from the castle. 

 

Lance was shocked by the sudden acceleration and was pressed deep into the cushion of the pilot seat. He let out a startled yelp, which was echoed by Keith’s own and followed by a thump sound. Glancing over his shoulder, Lance realized that the older red paladin had been thrown backwards from the force of the take off, and was now slumped against the back wall. The newer red paladin grinned sheepishly when Keith shot him an annoyed glower.

 

Focusing back on piloting Red, Lance realized that he practically had no control over her at all. Every time he tried to pivot the lion so she’d circle back near the castle, she would twist away, drifting further and further away from the ship. It was like she wasn’t listening to Lance at all!

 

“Lance, you’re not doing it right!” Keith grunted, coming up behind him and grabbing hold of the pilot seat to keep himself steady. The new red paladin grit his teeth, ignoring Keith’s advice. He could do this, he could get Red under control. He could figure it out.

 

Couldn’t he?

 

Well, Red didn’t seem to think so. At this point,  Lance was yanking the levers in any way he could, trying to steer the red lion off the course she seemed to of set for herself, which was straight ahead. Away from the castle. 

 

“Come on…!” the new red paladin huffed, desperately pulling back on the levers, but the lion just wouldn’t budge. Distant stars almost seemed to whiz by as the lion continued blazing forward.

 

“Lance!”

 

“I got this!”

 

“No you don’t! If you would just listen to me, I can show you what you need to do!”

 

Lance fell back against the pilot seat, letting go of the levers. “Fine. What do I do Keith? How do I make her listen to me?” he snapped, looking up at Keith with a stare full of frustration.

 

The older red paladin frowned. “You don’t just ‘make her listen’, Red does her own thing. You have to work off of her impulses”.

 

“You mean let her into my head again? You do realize how that went last time, right?” Lance fired back, hating the idea of re-opening that incredibly uncomfortable channel he had made with Red. Lance hated how temperamental the red lion was, it reminded him too much of himself.

 

“I know, but it’s the only way she cooperates. You have open up to each other in order to pilot her”

 

Lance sighed.

 

Yeah, he kinda knew he was holding back from Red. he didn’t want to admit it… but he supposed if he was gonna be piloting her, he’d have to be open and honest with her. He didn’t like it, but there was nothing else he could do. If Lance really wanted to help defend the universe, then he would have to adjust. Which, he knew he could easily do. It’s just, it would be a lot  _ nicer _ if it was some other lion he was learning to pilot instead.

 

“Okay, okay, fine” Lance muttered, looking down at his lap. Letting his eyes flutter shut, he focused on the distant presence of the lion’s connection that resided in the far back of his mind. He honed in on it, poked and prodded and jostled it in an attempt to get Red to open up again. But it felt like, no matter how much he tried to grasp at the connection, it felt like it was just slipping through his fingers. Like Red was deliberately holding back from him, refusing to acknowledge their bond, however weak it was.

 

A sense of hopelessness washed over him. What was he kidding? Of course the red lion doesn’t want him. Of course he couldn’t pilot her. He can’t do this. He just. Can’t. He’s gonna be a lion-less paladin. That’s all he’ll ever be, a useless spare wheel for Team Voltron.

 

Lance gave up attempting to reach out to the Red lion, instead he just brought a hand up to his head and combed his fingers through his bed hair, leaving them stuck and tangled so that his palm rested against his forehead. He let out a bitter chuckle, shaking his head. “I can’t do this”.

 

Keith crouched down so that he was at head level with Lance, frowning in concern. “Yes you can, Lance. You have to” he tried to encourage.

 

Lance ripped his hand away from his face, looking up at the red monitors in front of him. “No I can’t! Red doesn’t even like me! We’re barely connected!” he exclaimed, unhappiness lacing through his voice.

 

“Maybe, maybe I should just start being more like  _ you _ . She’d probably like me better then. Maybe if I-”

 

**“No”**

 

Lance blinked, looking up at Keith in bewilderment. The tone in Keith’s voice when he cut Lance off was startling, but the look on his face was even more so. Keith looked angry, furious even. Lance couldn’t help but withdraw a little, sinking back into his seat as he was trapped under the other boy’s laser stare. 

  
  


“You do  _ not  _ need to change who you are for anyone, Lance. Not even the red lion. It’s her fault if she’s choosing to not cooperate with you, okay? You shouldn’t...you shouldn’t have to be a completely different  _ person _ in order to fit into a new role! That’s... just not right” the older red paladin grounded out with such a fiercely earnest voice that Lance felt a chill run up his spine from the intensity of it.

 

Lance for some reason felt like he needed to defend himself, but he wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was the way he felt like he just got in trouble by a parent.

 

“I- I wasn’t being serious or anything--”

 

“--I don’t  _ care, Lance _ . Even if you’re just joking, you shouldn’t even consider doing that, okay?”

 

“Okay! Okay! Can we just… talk about something else, please?” Lance yelped, voice pitch rising a little. He tore his eyes away from Keith, frowning defensively. He heard the other boy sigh through his nose.

 

A few beats of silence passed before Keith spoke up again.

 

“What’s the blue lion like?”

 

Lance perked up a little, glancing back over at the other boy. He assumed that Keith was trying to change the subject, though it didn’t exactly help to remind him of the lion he has to leave behind. But he didn’t blame Keith, Lance knew that the other boy wasn’t the best at making conversation.

 

“Well, for one thing, she’s waaay less stubborn than Red” Lance snorted, crossing his arms behind his head, which earned a huff out of Keith. Lance smirked a little.

 

“She’s just...really chill, but also really upbeat? She reminds me of like, the cool aunt who always spoils the kids and is willing to do all kinds of fun stuff. She’s really easy to fly… no wonder she’s so accepting of new pilots…” he trailed off, another wave of sadness threatening to come over him again.

 

Keith seemed to pick up on this almost immediately, and so he spoke up quickly.

 

“You won’t have to pilot the red lion for too long” he assured, looking up at the dashboard.

 

Lance wanted to believe Keith, he really did…

 

But he couldn’t. 

 

Keith’s unwavering belief that Shiro would come back made Lance really uneasy. Not because he didn’t want Shiro to come back, he  _ seriously _ wanted Shiro back. No, Lance was beginning to really worry about Keith. Because if Shiro really was… gone for good, then Lance knew that Keith would take it really badly. And Lance didn’t want to see his teammate crumble, especially if he was the one to take Shiro’s place…

 

...Lance wondered if Keith even allowed himself to consider the possibility. 

 

“...Hey Keith?”

 

The older red paladin looked back to Lance, tilting his head curiously. “Yeah?”

 

“What if Shiro is.... Y’know, gone? As in, gone-gone?”

 

Lance hesitantly sneaked a side glance at the other boy, and took note to the way his face seemed to drain of color a little bit. Keith looked frozen, lips pulled down in a tight frown.

 

“He’s not. We will find him” Keith then insisted firmly, looking back to the window.

 

Lance frowned. “How do you know that for sure?” he asked quietly. Keith stiffened from where he stood, not replying. Lance worried his bottom lip with his teeth in concern.

 

“...Keith?”

 

“We are going to find him”

 

“But- what if he isn’t-”

  
_ “Lance!” _

 

The new red paladin sighed, shoulders shrugging in defeat. “Okay, okay. Nevermind. Forget I asked”

 

* * *

 

About an hour had passed after that. Eventually, the two had swapped places and now Keith was piloting the red lion. This time, she was actually listening. Go figure.

 

They decided to head back to the castle, because the rest of the team would likely be waking up soon and would be preparing to make a wormhole jump to Olkarian. On the way back to the ship, they ended up passing a large supergiant orange star. It casted long orange beams of light through the lion’s window, gently contrasting with the soft red glow of the lion’s internal lights. 

 

And Keith, well, he found himself pretty distracted by how this lighting complimented Lance’s features.

 

Lance was sitting down on the floor, head resting against the window, propped up on an elbow as he stared outside with a bored expression. His hair was still tossed up from not getting a chance to brush it that morning, and it was doing things to Keith’s heart. He was still dressed in his pajamas, the pretty azure color of them really complimented his eyes, which almost seemed to sparkle in the warm light.

 

Yeah, Keith was kinda having an internal crisis right now. This wasn’t fair.

 

He couldn’t stop himself from sneaking little glances at the other boy, some longer than others. It was too hard to resist when the person you have a crush on is sitting right there in front of you looking absolutely  _ breathtaking. _

 

It wasn’t until he accidentally made eye contact with Lance did he suddenly start regretting everything ever. Alarms went off in his head as he quickly ripped his gaze away from Lance and hyper focused on the dashboard, though he could see Lance staring at him in his peripheral vision.

 

“What?” Lance questioned, raising an eyebrow.

 

“Nothing!” Keith meeped, suddenly heavily contemplating ejecting himself out of the cockpit because of the fucking crack in his voice that betrayed him. His cheeks were burning.

 

There were several beats of silence, and Lance was still glaring at the older red paladin suspiciously.

 

“Is there something on my face?” Lance asked, running his hands across his face.

 

“No!” Keith finally turned his head to look back at Lance. 

 

“Are you sure??” Lance pouted. “It’s not something in my teeth?”

 

Keith wanted to assure Lance he looked  _ stellar _ , but he knew he couldn’t just say that. So, he tried to settle for something casual, praying it wouldn’t be awkward.

 

“Yes Lance, you look nice- goOD- OKAY. YOU LOOK OKAY”

 

Well, so much for not making it awkward. Keith was ready for the red lion to eject him into space any time now, ‘cause he was dying anyway.

 

Lance was silent for a moment, not taking his eyes off Keith, studying him.

 

“You think I look nice?”

 

Keith winced, pink blooming across his cheeks. It’s a good thing that they were in the red lion because otherwise it’d probably be really noticeable.

 

“Er…...yes…?” the older red paladin shrugged slightly, not taking his hands off the control levers. He tried a look over at Lance again, who appeared to be pondering this. Keith was half expecting him to throw out a cocky remark or something, but he was completely blindsided this time.

 

A small, contented smile ghosted over Lance’s lips as he leaned back against the window and continued to watch the stars slowly drift by, seemingly unphased by Keith’s awkward splurb. 

 

The older red paladin was certain that he would be feeling butterflies beat against his stomach for the rest of the trip back to the castle because of this.

 

 

 


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> time to really get the plot moving forward! the team has important missions they need to go on this time, but they may prove to be more of a challenge than expected

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO SORRY FOR THE LONG ASS WAIT LMAO  
> it's been months orz, i am so sorry it took this long. but i'm back in business now! you can expect more frequent updates on this fic from here on out ;)
> 
> also, if you love langst (and you probably do 'cause you're reading this fic LOL) then you should check out my newest fic, Odd One Out! (can be found here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/11963244 )
> 
> and one more thing: i redrew the front cover of the fic! my art has improved a lot over the past few months and since i'm finally back to writing, i figured i should come back full swing with an improved cover. 
> 
> this chapter is almost 8k, i think that might be a new record for me lmao. anyway, i hope you enjoy!! i updated to tags too so be sure to take a look at those!
> 
> come visit me on tumblr if you have any questions or just wanna rant about voltron! my url is Sniperlance!

Team Voltron had eventually reached Olkarian, informing their allies of their approaching arrival after having establishing a solid plan of action for their next move. They made a quick pitstop at the Blade of Marmora base to drop off Kolivan and gain new intel on the current situation of the Galra empire. So far, only two BoM spies have been able to contact the rest of the base. Based on what they’ve said, the empire is in a really chaotic state right now, which, has made communications with the BoM really spotty. The BoM is currently standing by for more information to come in from the inner reaches of the empire before they start utilizing their next plan of action.

 

On Olkarian, the team- (specifically Allura and Hunk) negotiated plans for repairing the ship with Ryner, who had become the new Olkari ambassador after King Lubos betrayed his people. The repairs could take a few days, as the ship took quite the beating after having it’s own attack reflected right back at it, no thanks to Haggar’s magic.

 

Lance had expected that the team would just be sticking around and helping with castle clean up duties, but he was surprised when Coran called everyone down to the lounge room to brief the paladins on what they would be doing while the Olkari worked on repairing the ship.

 

There was a lot that needed to be done before the team could be considered “ready” to get back into the swing of things. For example; the ship was running incredibly low on supplies. The food rations that were already dwindling by the time they rescued the Balmera were almost completely depleted now, which meant that they would have to get more. Which was why Lance, Hunk, and Coran were now on their way to a space trading hub.

 

They had actually stopped by the Balmera earlier, to pick up a sizable amount of tiny crystals to use as currency. (Since, the what Coran had wasn’t exactly hip with present day universe money). While they were at the Balmera, Hunk got to see Shay again, which was pretty awesome. Lance was happy for his friend to see his other friend. And with a lot of persuasion between Coran and Shay’s brother Rax, Hunk was able to convince them to let Shay come along for the trip to the trading station.

 

And so, the Balmeran now sat up in the passenger seat of the pod while Lance and Hunk rode in back. Lance _was_ gonna call shotgun again, but Hunk reminded him that Shay has never flown in a pod before and there weren’t any windows in the back, so she should be able to sit up front to enjoy the full experience. Lance was happy to oblige.

 

As they made their way to the trading hub, Lance’s mind wandered aimlessly, daydreaming thoughts passing through his head as he idly tapped his hands on the seat. He admitted, albeit reluctantly, that he wasn’t surprised to find himself thinking of a certain black haired paladin.

  


_“Just, uh… be careful and like… don’t die or anything”_ _Lance mumbled awkwardly, eyes pointed down as he absently scuffed the heel of his boot against the floor. Keith eyed the other boy carefully, as if he were analyzing Lance’s every movement. There was a thick, unspoken tension that lingered in the space between them, like an invisible wall that obscured any possible intimacy that had bloomed within the boy’s relationship thus far._

 

_“...Okay” the raven haired boy finally answered after a beat of silence, nodding slightly. Lance’s blue eyes flickered back up to meet Keith’s for a brief moment before he turned and left, making his way over to Coran and Hunk across the hangar. Lance could feel the other paladin’s eyes burning into the back of his helmet as he quickly shuffled off._

 

Lance frowned.

 

While he was going on a simple shopping trip that would take no time at all, Keith and Pidge had been sent on what could be considered a incredibly dangerous mission. They were traveling to a Kulvealian planet to get special shards from the core that would be used for the new engine Coran had planned to install in the castle. It was one of Slav’s inventions, called the Gravity Jumper.  From what Lance knew, it basically was the same thing as a teleduv, just more modern and didn’t require royal altean magic to power it. It certainly would come in handy, since Allura was going to be a paladin. She explained how the lions were able to create wormholes, which was pretty much the same way the castle made them. As long as royal altean magic could be used, then the lion would be able to open a portal. And since Allura was a royal altean, and a powerful one at that, she would be the one opening up wormholes for the rest of the team while Coran piloted the ship.

 

Lance wanted to convince himself that the nausea he felt was only because of petty jealousy that Keith got to go on a way cooler mission than Lance, but if he was really being honest with himself… it wasn’t that.

 

Lance was worried, and it wasn’t like he never got worried about his teammates or anything, he always worried about them, especially when they went on dangerous missions, though Lance never really showed it. It wasn’t something new to him, though… this time he couldn’t place the flitting sense of anxiety beating in his chest. Lance decided that it must just be because this is the first mission the team has gone on since… Shiro disappeared.

 

Lance could admit, with the assurance of one of their leaders absent, he did feel vulnerable going on missions. Especially because Shiro was someone Lance looked up to and admired, someone he aspired to be like someday.

 

But despite that reasoning, Lance still felt like that wasn’t exactly the issue. Maybe it was because Shiro went missing that the blue paladin (can he even call himself that anymore?) felt so apprehensive about his team being put in dangerous situations. That made sense… he was pretty sure that everyone else felt the same too. The shock of losing one teammate was bound to put everyone on edge when continuing the fight to liberate the rest of the Universe.

 

Lance wasn’t sure what he would do if he lost another teammate. He hoped that Keith and Pidge would be alright, but…

 

No. He wasn’t going to worry himself sick. Especially when he was sitting right there with his best friend, who could read him like an open book. Lance had already caught the concerned look Hunk gave him earlier and knew that if he kept fretting, eventually Hunk would ask him what’s wrong. And while Lance appreciated his friend’s concern (more than he usually let on), he was just so tired of his friends worrying about him all the time. It felt like over the past few days since his unfortunate outburst, it’s been nothing but the team feeling bad for Lance feeling bad about himself. He hated it. He hated feeling like he was dragging his team down with his personal problems when they didn’t need to be. They had more important things to worry about. And Hunk, despite being Lance’s closest friend, was no exception.

 

Lance let the tension in his shoulders relax and closed his eyes, hoping that he could fake taking a nap until they reached the trading center.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Thick, white swirls of snow fall whisked by the windshield of the red lion, spinning and trailing away in every direction as Keith swiftly flew over the surface of the Kulvealian. Everything in sight was blanketed in ice and snow, making what little of the surface that was visible look like a frozen wasteland, which- it was. Keith’s grip on the lion’s controls was tight and controlled as he made it a priority to focus on where he was going. While it was pretty much impossible to see in this snow storm, Keith didn’t need to worry about missing the point of entry into the planet’s crust. A small map of the Kulvealian’s surface directed him on his monitor. They were only a few miles away from their destination, it wouldn’t be long now.

 

It wasn’t the snow that made the muscles in Keith’s shoulders bunch up with tension, however.

 

The boy snuck a very quick glance over his shoulder, back at the other paladin who had joined him on this expedition. Pidge sat on the floor, eyebrows knitted together tightly and legs criss-crossed as her fingers typed away at her laptop’s keyboard. The clacking sound of the laptop’s keys was the only noise that was heard within the lion’s cockpit, and normally the familiar sound would put Keith’s anxiousness at ease, as did most of the familiar sounds of his teammates bustling about would.

 

However this time, the sound wasn’t exactly a comforting one. There was a thick cloud of tension that generated off of the green paladin. While Keith hadn’t come to the full realization of it yet, he had a feeling that something was wrong. Maybe if was the way she seemed to avoid eye contact, or the short, curt replies she would give if spoken to, Keith wasn’t sure. But something was wrong.

 

He bit his lip anxiously.

 

A beeping sound from his monitor brought Keith’s attention back to the task at hand. His eyes flicked back up to the screen, spotting the blipping red dot on the map. They were almost above the point of entry now. The raven haired paladin eased back on the controls, drawing the red lion into a slow descent towards the ground. Through the swallowing white blanket of snowflakes, Keith could make out a huge gaping canyon up ahead, stretching several miles long and probably only around fifty feet wide. It looked like a humongous creature had taken it’s claw and violently dragged it across the planet’s surface, leaving a huge black scar on a world of white.

 

“We’re here” Keith said, pulling the lion to a hover over the great canyon. Pidge looked up from her laptop, up at the screen.  She shut her laptop and stood, approaching the pilot’s seat so she could have a better view.

 

As the red lion begun it’s descent into the canyon, the white world around them faded into dark grey slabs and jagged outcroppings of rock and ice, almost reaching out to the one speck of color that was the red lion like greedy claws. Keith could sense Pidge shiver nervously beside him.

 

While Keith would be much happier to just dive bomb to the bottom of this thing, he had to be careful. He learned his lesson back on the Balmera that when descending into giant underground caves, you have to be careful and look out for outstretched pillars of rock unless you want to damage your lion. The descent to the bottom of the canyon seemed to last forever as the cave’s darkness swallowed them up. Soon, Keith had to turn on his lion’s headlights in order to see where he was going. The sound of rushing water echoed around them, and soon what once icy walls was now waterfalls turned black by the lack of light, running down the sides of the canyons like moving sheets of obsidian.

 

“Woah…” Pidge murmured breathlessly. Keith nodded, equally in awe.

 

By the time they reached the bottom of the canyon the sky above them looked like a thin sliver of light lost amongst the dark head spinning cave walls and cascading spray of water that formed a sleek, glossy river that moved very slowly. Looking closer, Keith noticed that a cloud of mist hung heavy over the river, he guessed it must be steam. Down here, it would be a lot warmer than the surface. And it would only get hotter the closer they got to the core.

 

“Let’s get going” Keith said, standing from his seat. They exited the lion, finding a ridge on the side of the river to walk on. For a moment, Pidge lost her footing and nearly slipped into the stream with a yelp, but Keith’s hand shot out and grabbed her arm, yanking her back quickly. Instead of thanking Keith though, Pidge gave him a glare and stalked forward, continuing along the ridge. Keith’s eyebrows drooped a bit. Was Pidge mad at him?

 

“We only have about three hours to get down to the core, gather the shards, and leave before the Kulvealian’s next magnetic cycle starts” Pidge’s voice up ahead pulled Keith out of his paranoid thoughts before he could dwell on things much. He caught up to the green paladin, who was currently tapping away at the panel on her wrist, pulling up a global map of the planet. At the center of the map, was a red blip, indicated where they needed to go. There were thousands of underground tunnels that all led directly to the core. It was similar to the Balmera, however from what Keith understood, it was far more dangerous. The planet wasn’t alive for one thing, and every three-ish hours, the core of the frozen planet would undergo a cycle where the planet’s gravity would increase drastically at random intervals. Unless Keith and Pidge wanted to get smushed into paladin pancakes, they would have to be very quick in retrieving the shards. The thought of being crushed under miles of dense rock made Keith shudder anxiously. He did not like it down here.

 

“Let’s get going then” he said, eager to get this mission over with. He moved on ahead, Pidge following, until they came across an open tunnel on the side of the ridge. The river next to them dropped off over a waterfall, crashing who knows how many feet down below. The spray of the water mixed with the steam made it harder to see, and it was already dark enough to where they had to turn on the night vision setting built into their helmets.

 

Pidge took one last look at the tumbling waterfall before following after Keith into the tunnel, which almost immediately stooped downwards at a very sharp angle. It wasn’t so bad that they fall, but they certainly needed to be careful. The ground was already damp with steam, but luckily the gripping of the bottom of the paladins’ boots gave them enough traction to keep their balance.

 

Down the tunnel they went, the distant rush of the waterfall and the paladins’ soft panting and grunting from their attempts to stay balanced up-right were the only sounds that filled the deafening silence.

 

The lack of any wind swishing by or natural light from a sky above made the hairs on the back of Keith’s neck stand on end. He glanced over his shoulder back at Pidge to check on her progress, making sure that she was keeping up. “Everything okay?” Keith asked hesitantly.

 

“S’fine. Just worry about yourself” Pidge growled shortly, avoiding any eye contact as she watched where she stepped. Keith’s heart sank a little bit.

 

They reached the end of the tunnel eventually, but it wasn’t long until they were climbing down more steep rock. The air temperature steadily increased as they made their way down, though there didn’t seem to be anymore steam. A strange light caught Keith’s attention as he carefully stepped over a sizable crack in the ground. He paused to inspect it.

 

There appeared to be… a glowing red crystal sticking out of the cave wall. Looking closer, Keith noted that there were more of them up ahead, sticking out of the ceiling and the floor, lighting up the cave in an otherworldly fashion.

 

“Woah, check that out” Keith gasped, pointing at the glittering crystals. Pidge peeked out from behind the taller paladin, looking rather indifferent. “Wooow, cool” she muttered nonchalantly with feigned awe as she shuffled past Keith. Blinking, Keith watched the green paladin trudging on, as if the weird glowing crystals didn’t interest her at all.

 

_Why is she mad at me?_

 

“Sometime before next week, Keith” Pidge snapped, voice dripping with sarcasm. Surprisingly, she already much further down the tunnel than Keith. Trying to shake off the pinpricks of hurt gnawing at his chest, Keith followed suit, the crystals no longer sparking any excitement in him.

 

After several minutes of carefully climbing down steep rock, the tunnel began to level out. Enough to where the paladins could simply walk without having to watch where they were putting their feet. Pidge had set them at a brisk pace, leaving no time for stopping and inspecting their surroundings. The air temperature had skyrocketed, to the point where Keith could feel himself sweating inside his suit. The suits certainly protected the paladins from extreme temperatures, but not enough to remain comfortable when it’s well over 1,000 degrees.

 

As the tunnel began to widen out, Keith could hear the sound of something rushing, similar to the sound of the waterfall he and Pidge saw earlier. How would it even be possible for there to be a waterfall all the way down here?

 

Then, the tunnel opened up completely.

 

Keith was completely and utterly amazed by what he saw next.

 

The tunnel had opened up to a humongous cavern, so big that the red paladin had to tilt his head all the way back to even glimpse the cavern ceiling, and even then he couldn’t see it that well. The cavern had to be at least a few miles wide in every direction save for the ceiling.

 

But it wasn’t the huge space that really got him. It was the towering columns of deep crimson and bright orange light that reached down from the cave ceiling like the fingers of a giant, all the way down to the bottom, where an endless river of hot light sat, moving by ever so slightly.

 

Not waterfalls. _Magmafalls._

 

 _“Awesome”_ Keith whispered breathlessly. It honestly was one of the coolest sights he’s ever seen in his life.

 

He tearing his eyes away from the magmafalls, the red paladin looked around a little more, wanting to take in as much of his surroundings as he could before they moved on. By the looks of it, they had stepped out onto a narrow, flat bridge made of dark maroon rock that jutted out miles high over the magma river. All around them, slabs of deep maroon rock stuck out from every direction, big red crystals growing out of them like the leaves of a tree. Long, thin strings of magma leaked out of the walls and trailed over the rock slabs, almost like a spider’s web. Clouds of hot gas lifted up off the river and puffed out of holes in the walls, steadily rising up and up into the air, swirling in gracious amounts. Wow, just…. _wow._

 

But damn, it was _hot._ Keith wished he could take his helmet off and wipe away the sweat he could feel beginning to pool at his forehead. Doing that would be sudden death though, Keith knew. The pressure down here was unbelievable. Keith felt so congested, it almost reminded him of what having a cold was like. Uncomfortably hot and sweaty, and a stuffy nose. Lovely.

 

“Let’s go” Pidge said beside him, reminding Keith that they had a mission to complete. She probably got caught up in the scenery too.

 

The red paladin followed his teammate across the bridge, carefully watching his step so he didn’t trip over a crystal or accidentally step off the side and fall. In front of him, Pidge had pulled her map back up and was currently checking to see if they were headed down the right path. They had to be especially careful, because while there were thousands of pathways that lead to the core, there was only a select few that were the safest routes. And only one out of those select few that was the quickest.

 

Luckily, it looked like they were going the right way.

 

Keith stared at the back of Pidge’s helmet as they walked, and frowned.

 

“Pidge,” he said, halting in his tracks. The green paladin looked like she was going to ignore him for a moment, but then she came to a stop. They stood a few yards apart next to a hot, glowing magmafall that tumbled downward and casted sharp, contrasting shadows across their faces, eyes aglow with orange light.

 

Keith’s fists balled anxiously at his sides as he stared at her back, trying to figure out what he wanted to say. He didn’t really know _what_ to say. He’s never had someone he considered relatively close be mad with him. Sure, Shiro has been upset with him in the past, but he always explained to Keith what it was he did that made Shiro mad. Despite his anger, Shiro was always patient with Keith. It was easier to deal with.

 

But obviously, this was much different, and the tension was beginning to drive the red paladin crazy.

 

“Are you….mad at me?” Keith settled for asking, cringing slightly at the pointlessness of the question. Of course Pidge was upset. She made it very clear to him.

 

“Take a wild guess” came the response, sharp like a blade. Keith winced at Pidge’s unforgiving tone.

 

“Is this about the argument we had a couple days ago…?” the red paladin questioned hesitantly, afraid that bringing up the topic would cause Pidge to start screaming at him again. He shuddered at the memory of how angry she was then. He supposed he could understand why Pidge would be mad at him for what he said, but that was a few days ago!

 

Pidge didn’t respond. Instead, she stared at the ground, her back still to Keith. He noticed that her own hands were balled into fists too, like she was doing everything she could to contain her anger.

 

“Pidge, I… I didn’t mean to make you mad…” Keith took a step towards her, but faltered when the green paladin’s shoulders tensed up.

 

“It doesn’t matter what you meant to do, Keith” Pidge hissed. The red paladin’s frown deepened as he found himself at a loss for words. It wouldn’t of mattered if he did, because then Pidge took a deep breath and continued.

 

“I know you miss Shiro, but you keep acting like none of us are affected by his absence too. You’re just… so _inconsiderate_ of anyone else’s feelings!” Pidge growled, her volume raising slightly.

 

Keith flinched, eyes flickering to the ground. He wanted to defend himself, wanted to defend his motives. Couldn’t Pidge just understand?

 

“I just think it would be best to find him because he’s our leader and-”

 

“NO! You just think we should find him because he’s like family to you!” she turned then, looking back at Keith with a fierce glare, causing the red paladin to shrink back.

 

Pidge seemed to notice the way Keith practically cowered before her, because her glare softened up, if only just a little. Sighing, the green paladin’s stare dropped to the ground. There were several beats of silence between them, only the sound of the magmafall rushing by them and the quiet pounding of Keith’s heart in his ears were all he heard.

 

“I would do anything to look for my dad and brother. But as paladins, we have no choice but to carry the responsibilities we are given because it can mean life or death for so many other living beings. I realized that when Sendak attacked the castle and Lance almost died…” Pidge said quietly, voice barely heard above the magmafall. Keith looked up at her, eyes sympathetic. That seemed like such a long time ago by now. If it hadn’t been for Pidge, Sendak would have captured Voltron, the team would have been split up, and Lance would of died.

 

Keith immediately dismissed that thought before he could let it fester.

 

“I know how you feel, Keith. But what you need to understand,” she back up at him again, eyes hardened and frown taut under the harsh glow of the magma’s light. “Is that you are not the _only one_ who thinks of Shiro as family. Not by a mile”

 

Keith held Pidge’s gaze until she looked away. There was a beat of silence before she spoke. “C’mon, let’s get going” the green paladin muttered before stalking forward, continuing along their path. Keith stood for a moment with his eyes pointed at the ground sadly, before he nodded and followed after her.

 

 

 

 

Eventually, Keith pulled ahead of Pidge, becoming so wrapped up in his thoughts that he didn’t realize when she began to lag behind a bit. The sound of a thump followed by a groan yanked him out of his thoughts and he immediately whirled around, concern rushing through him.

 

Pidge was on her knees, palms struggling to push herself back to her feet. She looked considerably exhausted.

 

“What’s wrong?” Keith asked, at her side in an instant. Pidge shook her head, frowning in confusion. “I just feel so heavy all of a sudden, I don’t-” but she was cut off, because as she made another attempt to push herself up, she was suddenly lifted up off the ground by a few inches, yelping in alarm. In that instant, Keith felt his body grow lighter.

 

Pidge ended up back on the ground with a little bounce, landing on her bottom. She blinked a mixture of surprise and confusion.

 

“I think the planet’s gravity is starting to go weird” commented the red paladin as he offered Pidge a hand, who gladly took it and pulled herself up.

 

“That’s impossible though, the Kulvealian shouldn’t be starting it’s next cycle for another two hours” Pidge said, pulling up the remaining amount of time they had to get down to the core and back out. But as she did so, her face quickly went from dismissive, to what can only be described as the most “oh _shit_ ” expression Keith’s ever seen.

 

“What? What is it?” he questioned impatiently, not liking the look Pidge had. The green paladin looked down at her panel before furiously typing in something and bringing up a new page and scrolling down it. “Uuhhhhh” she said as she quickly tapped on something and opened up what looked like some sort of diagram for the planet’s gravitational cycles. Swiping at a few words, Pidge suddenly froze up, finger hovering over the screen.

 

“What, Pidge??!” Keith snapped, leaning over and looking at the screen.

 

“Well, uh… I might of...miscalculated how much time there is before the next cycle starts” she admitted sheepishly as one of her hands went to rub at her neck despite the fact they are wearing suits. Keith felt like a cold block of ice had dropped into his stomach.

 

“How much time until the next cycle?” he asked quietly, eyes wide with shock.

 

“Well, if the information I downloaded on the planet is correct, then roughly….45 minutes…?” she cringed as she looked up at Keith. The red paladin felt paralyzed by shock, but before he could do anything, the gravity of the planet suddenly increased by a drastic amount, and he was brought to his knees with a shout. One of his arms shot out to try and steady himself but it proved to be pretty useless against the strong pull of the planet.

 

“AHgh!”

 

He saw Pidge flounder and flop back to the ground, this time completely on her back. Gritting his teeth, Keith tried to push himself up, but his body just felt so _heavy_ . It was like he was suddenly made of lead, or like his entire body had fallen asleep but he could still _feel_ it. It was terrible.

 

But, as quickly as it came, the sudden pull of gravity evaporated and Keith could stand again. Pidge groaned and shoved herself to her feet, rubbing the side of her helmet and wincing.

 

“Is there any way to track the gravitational shift patterns?” Keith asked quickly, his fight or flight senses beginning to kick in. The green paladin shook her head no, looking honestly so ashamed of her mistake. Keith’s frown deepened.

 

“Keith, we should just go back to the surface. We can come back when the cycle is over” she urged. Keith looked at Pidge, then out at the giant cavern that stretched all around them, then at the small, vent sized tunnel that yawned open from a slant in the ground just a paces in front of them at the end of the bridge. He considered their options quickly, before making up his mind.

 

“No, we need to get down there and get those shards” Keith decided. Pidge looked like she expected him to agree with her, because she was gaping at him like a fish.

 

“I- ex _cuse me?!_ Do you _want_ to get squished to a pulp??!” Pidge cried, arms flying out at her sides in exasperation.

 

Keith grimaced a bit, but his choice was final. He knew it was risky, but it had to be done. “The cycle isn’t gonna end for weeks, Pidge. That’ll set us way behind schedule. We have to take care of this now, so let’s go”

 

“This is a really bad idea, Keith” sighed the green paladin, shaking her head at him as she crossed her arms over her chest plate. “If we’re quick, we can make it” Keith insisted, looking back at Pidge. She looked like she wanted to argue further, but Keith didn’t want to sit around debating on what they should do. He made their decision.

 

That’s what team leaders were supposed to do, right?

 

Pidge let out a surprised yelp as Keith quickly scooped her up under his arm and dashed for the vent.

 

“KEITH! What the hell!” she yelled just as the red paladin hopped into the tunnel shoot with her, sliding down it quickly, much like the way he and Lance used the castle’s air vents to get to the pool.

 

The sound of Pidge’s yelling faded away as the two disappeared down the tunnel, the only sounds audible was the rushing of magmafalls cascading downward, almost peacefully…

  


* * *

 

 

“You know Coran, when you said “space trading center” I thought it’d be a little bit more...cleaner? Like the space mall?” Hunk said questioningly as he followed the altean leading the small group through the main district.

 

There were countless stalls and venues lined up shelf to shelf along the dirty, purple cobbled streets, filled to the brim with all sorts of goods that Lance had never seen in his life. Towering buildings made out of the same cobble as the streets, weird yet intricate patterns lining the sidings of the shining rooftops were placed all around them as far as the eye could see. Colorful, pastel sheets of fabrics of all shapes and sizes hung from thick ropes that stretched high above their heads, casting different hues of light on the ground from the pink sun’s light. Huge, puffy white clouds drifted by lazily across the pale blue sky. The streets themselves were crowded with people, aliens of all shapes and sizes and species, bustling amongst the market shops as they went about their business.

 

“I’ll admit, this one is a bit more, as you Earthlings would call it, “shaded” than some of the other shop centers we’ve encountered! Planet Zelfaricks never seems to change!” Coran admitted, a wistful and nostalgic sigh escaping him.

 

“Shaded?” Lance mouthed at Hunk, cocking a confused eyebrow at his friend as the group walked by a stall selling some kind of wooden contraptions. Hunk shrugged back. “I think he means “shady”” the yellow paladin whispered. “Ooooohhh” Lance mouthed, nodding. That made sense.

 

Lance then snorted, the thought of Coran trying to use Earth slang was pretty funny to him. Hunk rolled his eyes good humoredly before returning his attention to Coran.

 

“It’s truly incredible! I’ve never seen anything like this before!” Shay exclaimed as she walked beside Hunk. The Balmeran looked like a child in a candy store for the first time, looking in every direction with wide eyes and an even wider smile. She was practically grinning ear to ear in wonder.

 

It was adorable.

 

“It is pretty cool, huh? I’m really glad you were able to come with us, Shay” Hunk smiled warmly at his friend, drawing her attention back to the yellow paladin. She smiled back at him happily, nodding with enthusiasm.

 

“I’m still amazed you were able to convince her brother to let her join us” Lance said, an easy smile playing on his lips. Hunk looked back to his friend and nodded in agreement. “Yeah, for a moment there I thought he wanted to punch me or something” he muttered, chuckling uneasily.

 

Shay placed one of her large hands on Hunk’s shoulder, smiling at him sympathetically. “Rax is...protective, and very set in his ways. But you earned his trust when you saved our Balmera, Hunk. that’s more than enough proof that you mean well for our people” the Balmeran said reassuringly. Hunk grinned back at her, all his worries seemingly forgotten.

 

 _Ah jeez, he’s got it Bad™_ , Lance thought to himself.

 

“Alright youngin’s! Enough chatting! We have some important business to do now! We’re gonna need to-” Coran paused, stopping in his tracks. The group that followed closely behind him stopped as well. The people behind them shoved past the group, shooting irritated glares at them in their wake.

 

“What’s up, Coran?” asked Hunk, coming to stand by the Altean’s side. Though, Coran didn’t answer. Instead, he quickly ducked behind the yellow paladin, as if he were hiding.

 

“Coran?” Lance questioned, giving the Altean a weird look. “Is something the matter?” Shay asked, also looking at Coran in confusion.

 

“Shh! Pretend like I’m not here!” he whispered loudly, shooting them all a squint while he held a finger up to his mouth in a shushing gesture. There was a loud grunt from behind the group, and Lance felt something big shove him roughly. He stumbled into Shay, who braced her hands on his shoulders to steady him. “Oop- Sorry Shay!” the blue paladin yelped, looking over at whatever just pushed him. It was a large, reptilian looking creature with gnarly teeth and magenta colored eyes. “Move it, keeo’rkix, you block the way” it growled with a deep, heavily accented voice before shuffling past them, long scaly tail dragging behind it. Shay appeared visibly startled and was also ducking a little bit behind Hunk too.

 

Coran peeked out over Hunk’s shoulder at the creature as it passed by, waiting a few ticks before heaving a big sigh of relief and stepping away from the yellow paladin, who had placed a comforting hand on Shay’s shoulder while looking from Coran, to the creature, and back to Coran with a mixture of concern and confusion on his expression.

 

“What was that?” Shay asked fearfully, standing up straighter as the creature disappeared in the crowd.

 

“Yeah, do you know that guy, Coran?” Hunk questioned, raising an eyebrow at the Altean as he stepped away from Hunk. Coran brought a hand up to the back of his neck, rubbing it uncomfortably as he grinned nervously. “Well, let’s just say that I wasn’t always the smartest man in my youth, I might of accidentally wrecked Vilk’s incredibly expensive spaceship back in the day… and now he’s sort of… out for blood. My blood, to be precise” Coran explained anxiously, peeking back over the heads of the crowd to check if the creature -Vilk- was truly gone. Lance and Hunk’s eyes widened in surprise, Shay looking concerned for her new friend.

 

“Holy shit, Coran!” Lance exclaimed at the same time Hunk said “Dude!”

 

Croan then looked back at them, pointing a finger at Lance and Hunk defensively. “Don’t look at me that way! I was around your ages when it happened, so the two of you could easily make the same mistake!” he insisted, an almost childish pout forming on his lips.  Lance laughed, holding his hands up in submission. “We’re not judging! That guy just looks really mean, like he’d probably try to eat us if we made him mad” the blue paladin said.

 

Shay frowned, looking nervously between the other three. Hunk gave her shoulder a little reassuring squeeze as he looked at her. “Don’t worry, we’re not gonna let that happen” he assured the Balmeran gently.

 

“That’s right! We just need to make sure he doesn’t see me, is all!” Coran chuckled, his chirpy attitude returning to him as he clapped his hands together. “Alright, we need to start searching for those supply stalls! They should be over in the ship travel district, which is about 5 blocks away, give or take! We should also look for a place where we can exchange Balmera crystals for actual currency, because they’ll only get us so far” the Altean mused as he stroked his moustache idly.

 

“So what’s the plan then? Think we should split up?” Lance asked as the group began moving again.

 

“Hmmm, that might help save us some time” Coran commented thoughtfully as they weaved through the crowd.

 

“If we do, then I’ll go with Shay” Hunk added on, shooting the Balmeran a little smile who giggled slightly in response. Lance fought the urge to roll his eyes.

 

“Alright then! Lance, do you want to go with them?” Coran asked, looking back at the blue paladin who trudged after them with his hands stuffed into his pockets. Lance considered the idea for a moment, thinking it’d probably be more exciting if he went with Hunk and Shay, but decided against it.

 

“Nah, I don’t feel like third-wheeling. I’ll just stick with you, Coran” Lance said casually, shooting Hunk a discrete wink. Hunk’s cheeks flamed in reaction to the underhanded tease.

 

“Are you sure, Lance? We wouldn’t mind if you tagged along!” Shay asked with a tilt of her head. Lance shrugged casually, the corner of his mouth pulling back in a lazy half smile. “Nah, I’ll be fine. You two go have fun” he replied, decision final.

 

“Hm, then I think we have a plan! Lance, come with me. Hunk, Shay, you two look for a shop where you can trade those crystals in for some GAK. We’ll meet back up at the front gate of the main district when we’re ready. You have your communication device on, Hunk?” Coran asked the yellow paladin. Hunk held up his phone and nodded.

 

“See ya later, guys” Lance said as he and Coran bid the other two farewell. And soon enough, he and the Altean were threading through the crowd once more.

 

After clearing two blocks of merchant stalls, Lance realized he should of went with Hunk and Shay after all.

 

It wasn’t that he didn’t like Coran, but man he was bored out of his mind from listening to the Altean ramble on about stories from back in his day when he’d come here with his grandfather to trade whatever stuff they needed to. Honestly, Lance didn’t understand half the words that were coming out of the guy’s mouth. What even was a Blaggeronian Swalick Puaverator??

 

Ugh, Lance was really regretting this decision.

 

Still, he trudged on after the Altean, only half listening as he idly looked around at the passing merchant stalls. By the time they made it to the ship travel district, Lance was pretty Done™ with this.

 

“Hey Coran, I think I’m gonna look around a little bit, ‘kay?” Lance said, cutting the Altean off from whatever story he was talking about now. He didn’t even bother to stick around to hear a response from his teammate, ‘cause he was already speed walking away.

 

It wouldn’t be a problem, he has a phone. Coran could contact him if he needed to.

 

Feeling confident with his choice, Lance decided to wander about a little aimlessly, inspecting stalls, eyeing passing aliens. Eventually he found a stone bench in the shade of a building that a little further away from the rest of the crowd, an ideal place to chillax till his friends called him up.

 

He crossed his hands behind his head, leaning back till he was propped up against the building. Stretching his legs out in front of him, he crossed one over the other and surveyed the district.

 

It was more open than the main district, less congested with narrow streets and people. Kinda like several lots lined up together with stalls dotting it all over the place. From where Lance could see, there was an open, park like area from across the street of his location. A huge colorful tarp of fabric stretched over it to protect from the sun.

 

Lance blew a long sigh out his nose, pouting a little bit. Man, this was still pretty boring, but at least he wasn’t being forced to listen to boring stories that were completely out of context for him.

 

 _I wonder how Pidge and Keith are doing,_ Lance thought. He hoped they were okay, that mission they were on was a pretty dangerous one. It would be really easy to fuck up and get hurt, and knowing how impulsive and reckless Keith and Pidge could be…

 

Lance shook his head to clear his thoughts, not wanting to worry himself sick again. No, it was chillax time. Not fret over teammates time. Fretting wouldn’t help him right now.

 

Looking around again, Lance tried to find something to distract him. Something to keep him busy while he killed time. He didn’t really see anything of interest, and it wasn’t like he had any money on him to spend, so really there wasn’t much he could do.

 

Or at least, that’s what he thought until his eyes landed on an _incredibly attractive alien across the street._

 

“Hwoah” the blue paladin stuttered, immediately straightening up and pulling his hands out from behind his head.

 

He couldn’t really tell if they were male or female or some other gender from where he sat (not that it mattered to him), but _dang._

 

They were tall, had pale lime green skin with one thick dark green stripe going down each arm, covering the tops of their hands. Their hair was short, black, and looked really fluffy, and their ears were long and pointed. They were dressed in black sleeveless robes, one band of blue fabric wrapping around their midsection.

 

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

 

Standing, Lance glanced up and down both sides of the street before heading across with a confident, winning smirk on his lips.

 

The alien looked up from the stall they had been inspecting- as Lance got closer, he realized that they were likely male. He also noticed his eyes were a deep, sparkling blue. Wow. _wow._

 

“Helloooo there~” Lance smarmed, tilting his head at the alien boy. The boy looked down at Lance, a small smile playing on his lips. “Greetings, star traveler” he said, voice almost like honey.

 

 _So far so good,_ Lance thought confidently.

 

Lance opened his mouth to say something, but his words fell short when the boy held up a hand, looking down at the blue paladin thoughtfully, before pressing his hand to Lance’s cheek with a gentle caress, tilting his head up. He was getting all up in Lance’s space, leaning in until he was mere inches from the paladin’s face.

 

_Uhm, holy shit. Okay, scratch that, so far so REALLY good._

 

Lance meeped but didn’t pull away, not really sure how to react. He didn’t expect to get this far by just saying hello. His cheeks were burning. He could feel the alien boy’s breath ghosting over his face.

 

“Hmmm…” the alien boy hummed, studying Lance’s eyes like they were a piece of art. Lance glanced back and forth between the alien boy and the one running the stall they were standing in front of, who was watching them with a vaguely annoyed expression.

 

“Uuhhh……ha..ha… “ Lance stuttered sheepishly.

 

The alien boy frowned slightly then, pulling his hand away and taking a step back. “Hm, unfortunate” he mused, his hand going to his chin as he continued to study Lance.

 

“I-Wh-Y- Huh??” Lance blurbed, eyes nearly bulging out of his head in surprise. What did this guy mean “unfortunate”???

 

The alien boy seemed to read Lance’s mind, because he smiled almost sympathetically then. “I apologize, star traveler. I would of been interested in courting you, but it so seems that you already have someone in your life which you are seeking” he explained with a little wave of his hand.

 

“……HUH?” Lance exclaimed. Okay, now he was _really_ confused. What was that even supposed to mean?! Just what did this alien know about Lance?! Did he just read his mind!???

 

The alien boy simply smiled at Lance before dipping his head and turning away. “Good luck with him, star traveler! I’m sure he care much about you as well. Farewell!”

 

Lance stood there, mouth agape as he watched the attractive alien boy disappear into the crowd, only shaken from his trance when the stall runner barked at him in some alien language, which was a clear sign for Lance to move so other customers could look at the stall.

 

So Lance just started walking, not really sure where he was going. He was furiously trying to comprehend what just happened, but there were so many questions rushing through his head right now. He desperately combed his fingers through his hair, trying to calm down.

 

Who was the alien boy talking about? “Someone in his life he is seeking”?? Was… was the alien talking about… about _Keith?!_ He did refer to the person with he/him pronouns… how could the alien possibly know about that?

 

“Wait” Lance said dumbly, stopping in his tracks as his brain began to click things into place. His mouth dropped in shock as the realization dawned on him.

 

_“Oh my god”_

 

_Did I seriously just get unintentionally cockblocked by someone who is literally on the other side of the universe right now?!_

 

“Oh my god! I’m going to kick Keith’s ass!” the blue paladin exclaimed, throwing his hands up into the air. How _dare_ that jerk stop him from scoring! God, he just had to one up him at everything, _didn’t_ _he?_

 

“Lance! Is that you?” came a familiar voice, tugging the blue paladin out of his little fit. Turning, Lance spotted the unmistakable figure of Shay running towards him, a desperate look on her face.

 

Lance’s irritation was quickly forgotten.

 

“Shay? What’s wrong? Where’s Hunk?” he questioned, jogging up to meet the Balmeran. Shay halted, panting lightly and looking incredibly distressed.

 

“He- he was taken! We saw Coran and went to regroup with him but then that big one from earlier appeared and grabbed your Altean friend! Hunk tried to stop him, but- but more big ones came and took him too!” she cried. Lance felt his breath freeze in his chest.

 

Oh _no._


End file.
